Lessons in not accumulating cr*p
Sep. 30th, 2005 06:38 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
pjthompsonI had a lot of crap when I moved in here 8-1/2 years ago. I've acquired a ton more since. There's a lesson here in not accumulating too much crap--but I doubt I'll learn it on more than a temporary basis. I'll slim down and expunge, but sooner or later the collectocrapmania will start whispering to me again. Perhaps I won't collect quite as much. Or perhaps I will.
So far (and with a million more books to pack), I have gotten rid of one xerox box plus four paper shopping bags full of books. Well, "gotten rid of" is a relative term. The box and bags are still in my possession; that is, still on my living room floor. But they are on their way somewhere else. Eventually. I just haven't decided whether I'm going to hassle with the used book circuit or donate them to the local library. I supposed I could get a resell license and go on Amazon, but...meh.
When I pulled away part of my TBR pile that was stacked sideways in front of the books properly shelved, I discovered a goldmine of books which needed to be moving on. Some of these books have been unopened for two house moves. And that's enough, I think. Certainly, my emotional attachment to them has waned. I held on to my Nabokov set, Annie Dillard, John Fowles. I wasn't ready to not have them yet. Francine Prose is hovering perilously close to the edge. Her early stuff appealed to me but I'm not crazy about where she is now. But my set of Evelyn Waugh books, my set of Pynchon, MFK Fisher, Hotel du Lac, my EM Forrester set--gone! (ish)
I found a bookmark in the Forrester that was a folded up transmittal slip from my days working at GTE Engineering. I haven't worked at GTE in almost seventeen years. So long, in fact, that GTE no longer exists. It's Verizon these days. I know damn well I haven't opened that book since.
Gone!
Not without some regret, but without remorse.
So far (and with a million more books to pack), I have gotten rid of one xerox box plus four paper shopping bags full of books. Well, "gotten rid of" is a relative term. The box and bags are still in my possession; that is, still on my living room floor. But they are on their way somewhere else. Eventually. I just haven't decided whether I'm going to hassle with the used book circuit or donate them to the local library. I supposed I could get a resell license and go on Amazon, but...meh.
When I pulled away part of my TBR pile that was stacked sideways in front of the books properly shelved, I discovered a goldmine of books which needed to be moving on. Some of these books have been unopened for two house moves. And that's enough, I think. Certainly, my emotional attachment to them has waned. I held on to my Nabokov set, Annie Dillard, John Fowles. I wasn't ready to not have them yet. Francine Prose is hovering perilously close to the edge. Her early stuff appealed to me but I'm not crazy about where she is now. But my set of Evelyn Waugh books, my set of Pynchon, MFK Fisher, Hotel du Lac, my EM Forrester set--gone! (ish)
I found a bookmark in the Forrester that was a folded up transmittal slip from my days working at GTE Engineering. I haven't worked at GTE in almost seventeen years. So long, in fact, that GTE no longer exists. It's Verizon these days. I know damn well I haven't opened that book since.
Gone!
Not without some regret, but without remorse.