WEEK 12. SO MANY BOOKS, SO LITTLE TIME

Thanksgiving covers from last week's blog
about magazines.

At one time I collected vintage Christmas books, such as The Twelve Days of Christmas by Miles & John Hadfield, published in 1961with beautiful illustrations. I bought it in Mona Mia's Antiques at 1200 Decatur Street in New Orleans in 1990 for five dollars. I know because I use the receipt as a bookmark. I stopped collecting Christmas books when I realized I had too many to display properly during the festive season. But how can I discard these books that still give me pleasure?

I also have more than 125 cookbooks. This does not count books about food, like the memoir, French Fried: The Culinary Capers of an American in Paris by Harriet Welty Rochefort. Just holding any of these books not only makes me happy, but makes me want to open it up and start reading. Not the best thing to do while trying to simplify your life.

In The Life-Changing Magic of Tidying Up, the author recognizes that books are one of three hardest things to let go. She describes asking a client to “Please start by removing every book from your shelves and putting them all on the floor.” The client argues that it'd be easier if they were kept on the shelf so the titles could be read. But Marie insists each book must be held so the owner can decide if there is a spark of joy.

She devotes ten pages to books, explaining why they are difficult to discard but why they can be discarded. In my case, I hope I can discard some but I know it will be hard. Yvonne, a good friend, once gave me a beautiful, purple tote bag featuring a quotation from Thomas Jefferson that she said described me, “I cannot live without books.” Using e-readers, I-pads, computers, and phones to read books is very efficient and easy. And as I stated on Day 1, I first read Marie Kondo's book on my phone, but eventually had to buy a paper copy. I think most bookaphiles (bibliophiles) love to hold a real book in their hands. You can smell the paper and ink on them. You can flip back if you forgot someone's name, or need to know what town are they in now. You also can turn to the back cover to answer the question, who on earth wrote this? All much easier with paper than electronically. But real books do take up room.

A friend who retired to a much smaller apartment in a retirement community, showed off her only bookcase. I felt like crying for her, although she seemed pleased with the fact that she would have room for less than thirty books. For me, that's one shelf.

I do have paperback mysteries and other fiction that I should be able to discard easily. But I'm not always sure I've already read the book and I'd hate to discard something I haven't read yet. Because my memory (for minor details!) is not too great, I've started to write in each book where and when I bought it and how much I paid for it or who gave it to me. Then when I read it, I also add the date I finish reading it. If you need help, I recommend it. It refreshes your memory. I do it in pencil so if I do give the book away, I can erase this information.

For this project I can't possibly detail all that I'll have to go through.  I'll just focus on my collection of mysteries and start by piling them all together as the author suggests.

Well, I tried.  I am a failure. Each time I pick up a book, if I don't feel a spark of joy, I feel a very strong desire to sit down and start reading it as the only way to determine if I can discard it.  I can't work on this project right now.

If you are reading this, I'm sorry if I let you down as to this section of the project. Books are going to have to wait until I have gone through every other category. The next one, after papers and books, is komono which in Japanese refers to miscellaneous items. Marie Kondo points out too many people live surrounded by things they don't need, 'just because.' She lists the groups under this heading on page 106. Kitchen goods/food supplies is down at number nine on her list of ten. But since Thanksgiving is next week and I only have time to do one item, I will work on that one to get ready for the biggest food holiday of the year. Since I do enjoy cooking, it will be interesting to see what I discard. I have opened up some cupboards by discarding many magazines last week. The picture that accompanies this post are of food magazine covers that featured Thanksgiving turkeys. I kept all of them.