Confessions of an Obsession Part 6

I have mentioned my book-hoarding tendencies in previous blog posts. Yes, Im still a book hoarder. Sort ofI once spent two days searching for a thin book on composition that I thought I might have gotten rid of and which people were asking $75.00 for on Amazon resellers. When I finally found it, I put it somewhere I could always find it. I forget right now where that is. I may have to look later for my own peace of mind.

But I digress. I have way too many books for 4 wall-to-ceiling bookcases and three more short book cases which left 3 large piles on my bedroom floor. My bedroom is about 13 x 15, so its not tiny and the piles were against the wall by my side of the bed and on the other side of the tall bookcase, and not actually in anyones path, except when the piles by the bed would fall over, then it was hard for me to get into my nightstand.

Please, before I go on, I must insist I do read everything I buy. Well, almost everything I buy. Ok, at least half of what I buy, but a lot of things are strictly reference, and you don’t read those cover to cover - Audubon field guides and knitting pattern books, for example.

Being dismayed by the number of piles in my bedroom and the number of books shoved into a wall nook in my daughters old room, which consists of two shelves probably 3 1/2 feet deep and 3 feet wide (more suited for extra linens than books), I decided it was time for another purge. I had slowly built a few piles up in the short hallway by my front door, that were slated to go out. I started piling books there maybe 6 months ago.

This week, the piles by the bed and the piles by the door finally got to me. I cleared off the second shelf in my daughters room - now my guest room - and took some of my keepers up there. Im proud to say, I only filled a fraction of that shelf. I put several more books from this shuffling around by the front door so there were 4 significant piles there, and Friday, I took every single book out to my trunk and filled it completely - at least 150 books, consisting of books I had read, books that were out of date, books that were not what I expected when I ordered them, and yes, the occasional duplicate I had because I had forgotten I already owned it (maybe 2 or 3 of those).

Pathetic, I know.

Yesterday I drove to the local Meijer, which has a drop box in the back of the parking lot from Book world or World of books - cant remember the name exactly, and put each and every book in that slot - well, except I rescued two books I just couldn’t part with, but thats pretty good for a book hoarder, yes? I mean, Im looking for some kudos here or a well done. Not looking for someone to say you still have a problem. That was at least 150 books I put in that bin. So give a girl some credit. Ive taken over 200 books to the local library as well over the last couple of years. I worked long and hard hours to get all those books so if you try to take away the ones I really wont part with, there will be a bit of resistance. Ok, a LOT of resistance.

To close, I will say I am an amateur for sure. I watched an episode of Hoarders last week (it was a rerun, I had seen it before) about a couple who had approximately 400,000 books in their house. You had to walk sideways between the book cases. How their floors didn’t collapse, I have no idea. The city was going to be inspecting their property so they decided they needed to do something about the hoard. When the show was done, they had removed over 20,000 books from the living room and kitchen ONLY (this house had several rooms). Apparently they have been working on purging slowly ever since.

Ok, I maybe still own 300 books. Lets see, 24 book shelves times 20 books average per shelf - thats 400 books. Plus the overflow (theres still a pile between my dressers) and on one shelf in my guest room) so maybe 450 books. These people had 400,000!! I cant even imagine that. It takes me an hour sometimes to a find book I want to refer to but that should be much easier for me now that most everything is on a bookshelf. I don’t know how these people could even remember what they actually owned.

We wont discuss the few books I have in the closet in my sons old room. At least I don’t have any shoved under the bed. Well, I don’t THINK I do..