Later that night, I called Sally and told her I was sitting on the floor of my library, surrounded by hundreds of books I hadn’t yet read.
“Bring them with you!” she said. She knew how much I was giving up, how important my library was to me. “We’ll find the room.”
“I can’t,” I said, “The cost of moving them all would be outrageous. Plus, I have a bigger problem that I need to address, and bringing them with me just postpones the inevitable.”
I had to get rid of them. Most I sold to a local used-book store, but the lucky few in those 7 boxes came with me to New York. When I arrived in Brooklyn, Sally surprised me with a new bookcase she had picked up at a stoop sale. My 7 boxes filled about two-thirds of the case, and I swore I would never have more books than could fill this bookcase.
I’ve filled two more smaller bookcases since then, and have even more books on my Kindle. If I had the space for it, I’d probably be right back where I was before I purged the Treehouse.
But, this year, something changed. I’ve only brought 8 new books into the house since December.
What brought about this sudden change? The night I sat on the floor of my emptying library, realizing that I was acquiring more books than I could ever read, I did some math.
How many books could I read in the rest of my lifetime? I was in my 30s, so if I lived into my 70s and averaged one book a week, I had about 2000 books left to read.
While that might seem like a lot, it seemed like far too few for me. Plus, a book a week? Could I really read Boswell in one week? Proust? Gibbon? Not likely. 2000 was optimistic.
But, years later, I added it to my list anyway: #50 – Read 2000 books.
In order to achieve this goal, I had to read 50 books a year. I don’t think I’ve read 50 books in a year since I was in college, but decided 2009 was the year to start. For the first time in my life, I created a reading list.
In December, I reviewed all of the books I owned but had not yet read, about 250. (Most of them are ones I brought with me in those 7 boxes.) Creating a list of 52 books to read this year meant 200 that were not going to be read for at least another year, 150 for at least 2 years, and so on. It was sobering.
I use LibraryThing, which made the whole process much easier. As you can see I’ve kind of rigged this year to make it easier on me. There are several graphic novels, and a few books under 200 pages, but if I have to do this every year for the rest of my life, I can’t fail the first year I try.
As of this writing, I’ve read 28, so I’m in pretty good shape. More importantly, though, the process has helped me address my book problem. Rather than just picking up books that I might want to read in the distant future, I now see new books in a new light. Will I read it next year? Do I want to read it more than that Pelecanos that didn’t make this year’s cut? Should it really be one of the 1,948 I have left to read in my lifetime?
I have found the process so helpful, I’ve already started on the list for next year.
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