bookshelves

There are a lot of things going on in the "outer" world - a group of fools choosing to use their freedom of speech to desecrate the graves of the very men who fought to defend that freedom of speech, some fool who got on a plane when he had a contagious, drug-resistant form of TB - because he didn't want to change his wedding plans, the usual round of human selfishness or foolishness that tends to make the news.

But today I want to talk about something happier.

My bookshelves.

This is in part because I bought MORE yesterday. I have a Target visa card, which means that every time I accumulate purchases of $1000 (which takes a while - I'm pretty frugal and don't shop at Target all that often - but it happens) - I get a certificate good for 10% off one day's shopping.

(Last time I got one, I used it to buy my dvd player).

I had big plans for this time - I needed more bookshelves, Target has these fairly cute, easily-movable, faux Mission Style folding bookshelves. I thought I could fit two more in my living room, so I bought two.

(My house is rapidly reaching Total Bookshelf Domination. I have shelves in every room except the bathroom and kitchen, and those don't have bookshelves only because they are too small (and the bathroom tends to be too damp; I don't have a fan to exhaust the steam from the shower).)

I put up one bookshelf in my living room, though. (And it's okay that the other wouldn't fit; I can still have my nice big comfy chair in its same spot - it would have had to move if I had put the other shelf in - and I have a place to put the second shelf).

I started filling it. My shelving-system for books is a mixture of my own idiosyncratic preferences and laziness (as in: "I don't feel like carrying this book back to its proper shelf but here's a spot where it will fit"). So my bookshelves are even more confused, in many cases, than the famous files of Mrs. Basil E. Frankweiler.

But when I get a new bookshelf, and can fill it "from scratch," there is more of a semblance of order. I have three of the Target bookshelves in my living room now; one has my math and science books on it (top two shelves: biology and ecology. Third shelf: math and physics. bottom shelf: geology, geography, and a few other things that are probably more anthropology than anything). The second bookshelf has some of my history books (top shelf: Euro history since about 1500. Second shelf: American history, mostly Revolutionary Era. Third shelf: ancient history and pre-1500 Euro history. Bottom shelf: again, a mix of stuff, some of them books on single topics (like "The Amber Room.")

This third shelf I decided to put "read-reading" books on (novels). The top two shelves are mystery and spy novels - the top shelf has all of my snazzy Folio Press editions of things (Hercule Poirot stories, Miss Marple stories, the new huge "Anthology of Shorter Crime Fiction") and also some other nice hardbacks (an older - but not antique - edition of Sherlock Holmes, some Dorothy Sayers. The second shelf is paperback mysteries - though mostly only ones I've not read yet; the idea is that I can reach over from my big comfy chair and pull books off the shelf when I want to read.

The third shelf is just a mix of novels, mostly more recent novels, a lot of them were books that had been piled beside my bed (part of the reason I wanted more bookshelves was to get rid of that pile. I kept knocking it over and having to re-stack it, and it makes sweeping the floor a pain because you have to pick up all the books and put them somewhere while you do it).

The bottom shelf is some overflow (from other bookcases) of spirituality, ethics, and religion books - mostly stuff I've already read, because that shelf is less accessible than the others.

(I'm not a big re-reader, but I rarely get rid of books. And I NEVER get rid of a book I really liked when I read it; I always figure I will want to look something up in it someday).

I do have three other bookcases in the room (my living room is quite large; it's like 20' by 15'). These are three, seven-foot-tall bookcases I had custom made years ago, back when I had a doll collection. (Now they house books). It's pretty much a gallimaufry on those shelves - I should go through and rearrange them sometime; what happens with those is I'll move books off to other places as I read them, and stick new books on as I get them, so the original order has pretty much mutated into a disorder. I have a couple shelves of other Folio Press books, and a couple shelves of British Victorian (mostly Anthony Trollope, one of my favorite authors). And I have a shelf devoted to some old Heritage Press editions that I either inherited or bought cheaply used. And a shelf of South Seas stuff. And one of poetry (although that spills over onto other shelves). And on, and on.

I love books and it gives me a lot of pleasure to have them around. Especially on a newly-arranged bookshelf, like my new shelf. There is something shiny and pleasant and nice about it - part of it is the order, part of it is perhaps a little bit of seeing-things-new (I didn't realize how many unread Ngaio Marsh mysteries I had until I tracked them all down and put them in one place).

I sometimes wonder if the love of books is somehow partly genetic. One of my grandfathers (the one I spoke of the other day, the WWI aviator) was so devoted to books that I've been told one of his sisters said, "He will wear the same awful old winter coat, and spend all his money on books." And one of my great-grandfathers on the other side of the family didn't learn how to read until he was 25 or so, but once he did, he was never without a book or other reading material, because he was so proud of finally knowing how to read and he loved it so much.

(I have books inherited from both of them).

I have books lots of other places, too - my guest room has some built-in bookcases where I mainly keep books I've already read, but want to hang on to. And in my dining room, I have a wall of bookcases (again from Target but a different style than the Mission ones) that house my cookbook collection (I have lots of cookbooks; I love cookbooks, especially slightly older ones) and some of my gardening/nature books.

For example: I have a field guide to the mushrooms. The mushrooms of France, which is totally impractical, because the species here are different and I never plan on going to France (to hunt mushrooms or otherwise). But it's such a beautiful book - two little volumes, printed in, I think, the 1920s. Full of color plates that were made from watercolor paintings of the mushrooms, some quite colorful. I got the book because when the mycologist at the school where I did my grad work retired, he gave away a lot of his books. (An aside: my slightly jerkish labmate-at-the-time heard about it first and didn't tell anyone else - even though the prof had asked him to pass on the news - until he had gone down and pulled out all the immediately-useful books and the ones that looked like ones he could sell). But I still got the little French mushroom book and I look at it from time to time just because it's so pretty.

I also have bookcases in my bedroom - a big bookcase full of "childhood books" (both books I had saved - like my well-used set of the Chronicles of Narnia - and also books I had read as library books but then tracked down because I wanted to re-read them as an adult - like "The 101 Dalmations" [which is VERY different in some ways from the Disney movie] and "No Flying in the House" [which I searched for FOR YEARS and was overjoyed to finally find in a used book shop].) I also have two smaller bookcases with mainly spiritual/religious/ethics books on them, and also a few novels interspersed (again: my filing system breaks down periodically).

Finally - I have a sewing room with shelves; those house my quilting books and magazines and my knitting books and crochet books and other craft books.

It was actually good the second bookcase didn't fit in the living room; I can put it in here - my knitting magazines are beginning to overflow their current housing. (And I don't get rid of "pattern magazines" either - I figure there will be something I want to make someday, or something I want to adapt). I think what I'm going to do though is put all my quilt books together on the new shelf (right now they're mixed in with the other craft books) and use the newly-emptied spaces to hold the magazines.

I suppose to some of you this all sounds a bit Collier Brothers. And really, looking at it coldly, maybe it does. (I do get rid of some things: I don't keep "magazine-magazines" and I have given away books I didn't care for. In fact - I have a big box of "meh" books that I keep saving for the library's used book sale and should take down there some time).

The last apartment I lived in - when I had probably only 2/3 of the books I have now - when an inspector for HUD came through (it's a long story but all the apartments in town have to be inspected by HUD; it has something to do with some of the people who live there getting assistance. But HUD can inspect ANY apartment, not just the ones they're subsidizing). She didn't like what she saw, all the books (but they all were on shelves! That's what gets me - they were all neatly arranged) and she claimed they represented a "fire hazard." The manager of the complex recommended I rent a storage unit for some of the books (and, of course - they also rented storage units on the side).

That was actually what propelled me to go looking for a house of my own to buy - I was so fed up with the silly "rules" that came down new every year. And I was fed up that my upstairs neighbors smoked, threw their still-burning cigarette buts into my potted plants on my patio, and yet, my books were a "fire hazard."

I tend to feel like, by offending me that way, the rental company lost out: I was a quiet tenant. I never complained about anything. I didn't break stuff. I ALWAYS paid my rent on time (actually, usually a day or so early). I didn't mess up the apartment, I didn't do anything that attracted bugs. I just had a lot of books.