The annual Used Book Sale is coming up this week at school, the perfect opportunity for me to pare down my book collection to the essentials. I'll be reducing the objects in our home, and helping the school at the same time. It's a win-win.
Except that I don't want to pare down, reduce, or any other form of minimalising. Not when it comes to my books.
Maybe I'll never read them again, but they all represent phases of my life -- different levels of growth, maturity and interest. I have books on animals, environmentalism, writing, physical training, pregnancy and child-rearing, dog-raising, university textbooks, home plans and how to run a business. I have novels that were special to me when I was a child, and novels I haven't yet read. I have classics and I have New York Times bestsellers.
Books aren't just possessions; they are an extension of the person who read them. The words enter the body through the eyes, and form a part of the essence of the person, informing their thoughts and their actions. The books live and breathe through the reader, and the reader is changed for having read them.
When I am dead and returned to ashes, I would like my family and friends to be able to browse through my bookshelves and be reminded of me: my likes and interests, maybe my quirks.
In the end, I set aside a small pile of books that were neither compelling nor commemorative -- some run-of-the-mill paperbacks and nondescript novels that had been left at our house at one time or another by friends and family.
The rest will remain on my shelves, probably gathering dust. But just looking at their spines brings me happiness. And in the end, they will leave a record of a life well-read.
Maybe I'll find a better path to minimalism in the linen closet.
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