Today is a momentous day for me

[wook77]

As much of my flist knows, I'm moving in Feb/March timeframe to a brand-spanking new house (as in, they just broke ground on building my house this past week).

I'm a book h0r. I hoard books. I sometimes pick them up and pet them as I love my books that much. When I moved to Arizona three years ago, I had 40 boxes of books and I've not gotten rid of more than 2 or 3 books since then but have bought many many more.

Today, then, is a momentous day for me. I'm purging books because I don't want to move them to the new house. I figured out that it costs me 27 dollars a box to move them (calculating the average weight of a box of books vs the rate per pound).



I'm over 10 boxes of books down and I feel like weeping. Some of these books kept me company in the lonely days of first moving across the country with not knowing a single person. Some of these books comforted me when I was in college, after my two engagements ended or when I was suffering from teenage!angst. I've tied up so much of my life in these books, they've become friends, in a way. I know when I'm in a certain mood, I can go to my shelves and pick up a certain book and thumb to a certain passage to feel better.

It was only fitting that the first book I placed in the first box was the first book I bought for myself with my first paycheck. It was a teenage romance novel abuot a girl that had to choose between two boys she liked very much during the Johnstown flood and it was called "Jennie".

I'm ready to get rid of these books and I don't mean to imply anything else. I've found that perhaps I've tied up too much of myself, my hopes and dreams, my vision of real life romance, into these books. In previous times (back when I actually dated instead of being fat and loser-ish), I would compare the boys I dated with the men in the books and real life never stacked up.

It's time to be a bit more realistic about my life and my goals. It's time to not have so much of me tied up in thousands (and yes, I do mean thousands) of books and spend a bit more time in the real world. It's time to only keep those that I enjoy leikwhoa and purge the rest.

But still, I feel like weeping because these books have meant so much to me and I feel like I'm giving away a beloved pet or something. The only thing keeping me from actually crying is that these books are being donated to the media sale at work so that the proceeds from the sales will help victims of animal cruelty. At least I'm helping someone out. I don't think that I could do this if I were to have a yardsale and sell them.


To make this less about me and my angst... do you all have a favourite book that you just can't bear to part with? Cheesy romance novel, sci-fi, fantasy, murder mystery, book read to you as a child, any of them. Is there a story behind why?

and please, I know we all can't bear to part with the HP books

Comments

[midnitemaraud-r.livejournal.com]

I so rarely throw out books. When my parents moved back in 1991-ish, I had about 6 huge boxes of books in their garage - my childhood books, school textbooks, and some others I hadn't taken to my apartment. They threw them out in the giant dumpster. I managed to salvage the two boxes with my Bobbsey Twins and Trixie Belden books and a couple of others tossed in but I was DEVASTATED when I lost the others. Broke down in tears.

The books I won't part with now? Too many to list, but they include:

anything by Dan Simmons
Frank Herbert's Dune books
David Eddings' Belgariad and Mallorean and companion books
Harry Potter
most of my Star Wars books (espcially the X-Wing books!)
my Trixie Belden books
anything by Madeleine L'Engle
Diana Gabaldon's Outlander series (including the Lord John stories)
George RR Martin's ASOIAF series
Orson Scott Card's Ender series
Good Omens

[wook77.livejournal.com]

OH man, if my mother had ever done that, I think I would have weeped. Thank the maker you got some of them back. That's so rough. I go dumpster diving for stuffed animals as well. I can't stand to see things like that, that obviously could give comfort or whatever, getting tossed. They're totally donate-able and I don't understand throwing away something someone else could use.

Madeleine L'Engle!!!!! I have so many of hers! I felt like such a grown-up reading her stories when I was very small. She's brilliant.

I've never been able to make my way through Dune, quite honestly. It was very dry for me and I couldn't do it.

[midnitemaraud-r.livejournal.com]

Lots of people have issues with Dune. I didn't like it the first time I read it, then I read it again a few years later and I did. Well, not the second book. Didn't like that one. But I loved the last two, which a lot of people don't like. There's a lot of philosophy and other crap to wade through, and that can get really tedious, not to mention keeping all the characters and family lines and ancestors straight.

I don't usually rec them to people though because people either love them or hate them and since they're rather famous, people will usually pick them up on their own and at least read the back cover to decide for themselves.

I love Madeleine L'Engle. I read Wrinkle in Time in 6th grade and immediately went out and bought the other two in the trilogy, and gradually picked up the others. And read them over and over and over. Every year I re-read them. And even as an adult, I was stalking the children's/teen section of the book stores waiting for new releases! They're my most read books. I love them and would never part with them. Even when my niece is old enough to read them, I'm buying her her own! *g*