How Sheltered can you possibly be?

And so the story continues. As it goes on, it continues to increase in it's dramatics, one part of the story that sticks with me the most, is when Guy Montag questions his wife, about something so special and so simple, when they first met. However, Mildred cannot remember and this makes me wonder if maybe people are so sheltered from reality and their emotions, that they cannot even remember happy memories. Mildred, along with all of her female friends that we meet a little bit farther on in the tale, all seem to be so empty inside, like all of the human senses and emotions have been sucked right out of them. This also makes me wonder if books are, in fact, what keep us so alert and so full of the emotions that we all express daily. Can books really be such a large part of our lives that without them, and without all of the history and discoveries and tales of our fellow men, we will in fact become zombies? Robots even? Without books, existance is only what you allow it to be, and in Farenheit 451, existance is only in a three walled room.