Life of Wry

So, I was reading the funnies this morning, as you do on a Sunday morning, and smiled sorta wryly at this one…

And it made me think of my little book disease. I buy, or otherwise acquire, books at an alarming rate. I hear about a book on NPR (and I write it down so I can order it), or someone tells me about a book (and I hunt it down and order it), or Amazon suggests I might like this or that book (and I click on it and then one-click pay for it), or I’m in Avid Reader and suddenly leaving with three or four books under my arm.

And I hardly ever read them. I mean I read some of them, but a very small percentage of the ones I buy.

I resisted for years (decades) joining a book group because I was afraid I wouldn’t be able to keep pace (nor choose my books). And now I’m in a book group (and struggle to keep up, but I’ve read more books this past year than in a long while).

All I EVER want to do is curl up with a book. It calls me ALL THE TIME. But I always have just one more thing I need to do before I feel like I have the time, and my decks clear enough, to relax into reading. That would require an hour or two. And I seem never to have that kind of time. Even though, truthfully, all I have is time. Tons of it. I WANT to be that person of leisure who’s seen sitting in a cafe reading a physical book. Nothing appeals more to me than that.

Well.

Can’t explain it. I want to read. Books and stories call me ALL THE TIME. I have a lifetime of books I could read without acquiring a single additional book. And yet.

So I came home this morning after finishing brunch at Bernardo’s (an absolute Sunday morning ritural) and took photos of all our book shelves. Shelves stuffed with books I need/want to read. Here they are…

In the living room, I’ve run out of space on the shelves and am stacking books at the moment…

These (above and below) are mostly fiction. There’s a shelf of just Davis authors, there’s a shelf of just Neil Stephensen (Jim’s favorite author). There’s a shelf of poetry, one for spiritual books.. etc.

Those above are mostly travel, recreational (like hiking, camping), or international stuff. There’s a shelf of nature books (including books by my grandpa and uncle. This is also where I keep yearbooks, photo books, etc.. not, thankfully, on the reading list.

Non fiction books, political books, biographies, memoirs.. a whole stack of Michael Pollen.

Comedy, humor, and I’ve forgotten what those are on bottom shelf.

Cookbooks, of course.

And in the pantry, more cookbooks.

Peter’s books (and thankfully, those aren’t on my reading list), but it’s all of his favorites, including the entire Calvin and Hobbes collection.

These really don’t count.. they’re also in Peter’s room and are mostly college texts.

And a door stop.

The horror of my office. No real books of interest here.. mostly parenting and baby books I couldn’t give away yet.. hanging on to them, you know.. in case someone decides to have kids…

I remember hauling boxes of books to the library for their give-aways or book sales some years ago.. so at least some go out the door. But these all have to remain because I aspire to read a huge percentage of them. I LOVE having books around. Love the possibilities they represent for mind opening, mind expanding, mind bending, mind relaxing.

Think of all the time I’d have if I didn’t blog. And especially if I didn’t blog about the books I’m not reading.

(Note: I wrote this on Sunday, but realized I hadn’t blogged on Saturday (really??). So backdated it to Saturday and wrote another for Sunday. Does anybody care about this detail? No, but I do, so I’m clarifying.)