building a library

You know how it goes.

Say you're invited to somebody's house. Doesn't matter if it's a friend or a stranger and you find yourself in a position where you're idling by yourself in a corner of the room just killing time until you get/have to leave. There are always the obvious ways to pilfer away the hours. Check out any of the pictures they have lying about, compliment them on the cleanliness of their abode or just stare out the window and look like you are pondering something important.

Or, most likely, somewhere in this somebody's house is their personal library. This is what I like to do. I don't believe it is a true indication of the owners personality or character, but a commentary on the phases he/she had gone through since they became old enough to read.

I moved into a house with 3 writers. A reporter and aspiring poet and another aspiring technical writer. As you might imagine, their combined book collections is impressive. In addition, when I consider what they had to read to receive each of their bachelor's degree I'm even more impressed. This is why whenever household conversation broaches literature at any level, I feel like an 3 year old who just walked into think tank debate. The word's a re pretty and sound kind of funny, but I'm more interested in the wall decorations.


How I obtained many of the books I now have in my possession is still somewhat beyond the power of my memory. I believe most of them had to be gifts from either birthdays or Christmas'. There was that Wyoming winter when i spent many, many an hour inside a warm little cabin with nothing else to do but figure different methods of keeping the mice from scurrying across my sleeping bag at night. (believe me, I know) That year, I asked for nothing but books from the family and that's exactly what i got and makes up for about half of my current collection.

Most of my favorites have been given to friends somewhere in the past. For the longest time i never believed in keeping the ones I really enjoyed, but tried to figure out who else would enjoy them as much as I. The other half my current collection are a hodge podge of parting gifts, high school year books, spanish or japanese language material, travel guides and the rare novel I couldn't pawn off on someone else.


Since I got the job at "the Noble", I've been trying add a book a month to my own meager collection. The discount that comes along with the job makes adding on a weekly basis quite tempting. The problem is they're still pretty expensive, especially because the books I'm drawn to are histories and sciences running around 40 bones a spine. The way I figure it, even though I don't have time now to read anything but a magazine article or two before bakery shifts, at some point in time things will slow down. And it's at the point in time I would very much enjoy looking up at the bookcase in my home excited at the knowledge just pages away.

And, if nothing else, it'll serve as an easy conversation starter for anyone having to kill time in my living room.