My Book Life

I own a lot of books.  I mean, a LOT.  I have them in bookshelves in my house, and in boxes in my house, and in boxes in my mother's house and in boxes in a storage unit.  Air-conditioned storage unit, so they don't deteriorate.  My book purchases may have slowed the last ten years but they haven't stopped, so I'm just getting more and more and more books.  And I like that because I like books.
   But I got to thinking that maybe I needed to get rid of some of them.  By which I mean put more of them into my already-crowded storage unit.  Then I had a thought - a blasphemous thought - maybe I'd give them away.  I have a lot of cool books, I know someone would appreciate them like I do.  Maybe a library* or an old folks' home or something like that.
   I looked at one of my shelves, trying to think of which ones should go to a worthy inheritor.  But each book had a story.  I knew when I got it, gift or purchase, how long it took me to read and whether I liked it or not.  No surprise - I like most of the books I own.
   Then I moved to another book case, another shelf.  Same thing.  Each one had a story.  I picked out a few and turned to a random page.  I remembered reading them all, sometimes even to the time of day and what was happening around me.
   It hit me then, the reason I keep books, even if I keep them in boxes in a building ten miles away, is because my life is narrated by them.  Looking at these books is like archaeology into the Ancient Don.  I know what I was reading when I was in middle school, then high school, then college, then young adulthood, all the way to now.  Getting rid of them would be like erasing part of me, the part that's led to the person I am right now.
   Long story short, I'm keeping the damned books.  My new ones are going to need company.


* or liberry.  You're welcome John West, my old boss at the Abel Liberry at Austin College.