A Bent for Books

I am a self-professing bookaholic. Call me crazy, but I LOVE the smell and feel of books. I love it the first time you open them and the binding crackles and you read that first introductory sentence. However, I also love old books and have collected several of them. I love them for the way they are decoratively bound and have that presence of a wise and world-worn friend.

I have a few friends who understand my fetish – and admit to me that they actually feel the same way. As a homeschooling mom, summer is one of my favorite seasons – not for the fact that school’s out, or the trip to the beach, or the sleeping in late. It’s for those shipments of new curriculum books that begin arriving at my house! It’s a thrill each time the FedEx truck pulls up out front. And then there are the curriculum fairs. I attended a used book/curriculum fair one Saturday recently and then spent all day another Saturday at the South Carolina Home Educators’ Conference, where there were dozens of curriculum representatives with their books all laid out for you to open, peruse, and even buy. Those were great days!

I can’t imagine myself ever enjoying an e-book – even if you can get a can of new book smell to spray on it (really!). I use my computer only for necessities – to check my email, research, and write pieces like this. Otherwise, at the top of my list is sitting down with a “real” book, one that has a cover and paper pages.

My fantasy is this: To have one of my novels published and make enough from the book sales to equip my sunroom/office with wall-to-wall book shelves and organize them in such a way that it passes as a library.

When my son and daughter studied Guttenberg and the printing press earlier this year, one of their visual exercises was to count the number of books we have in our house. We have about 500. They are in my sunroom/office on a few bookshelves, stacked beside my bed, in baskets in the living room, as well as in various places throughout the house – including most tabletops.

I have written about countless high-dollar homes over the past 20 years for various architectural and home furnishing magazines. Many of these homes that I have been fortunate enough to visit have true libraries: floor-to-ceiling exquisite wood shelves with a sliding ladder and classics galore. These are the times I covet.

When I lived in Asheville, I was an annual member of the Biltmore Estate. Once, and only once, a special “Day in the Library” event circulated for members. For an additional fee, one could spend the day – with assistance – perusing the thousands of treasures that have graced those shelves for almost a century. Within hours, the event filled up. Major disappointment!

I’m afraid that my bent toward books has been passed onto my son. Even though he doesn’t share my joy in the arrival of new curriculum, he does love new books. In fact, he’s not much interested in checking out books from the library. He wants to own them. His library has already begun. Neatly arranged on his tall bookcase are his C.S. Lewises and his J.R.R. Tolkiens, plus many other single novels, trilogies, and series. He reads them over and over, yet treats each volume so respectfully that they appear unopened and unread as they sit neatly on the shelves.

Reading for us is something that is done in the mornings during our times with the Lord, during breakfast, during lunch, and occasionally stolen moments in the afternoons, and before bedtime. Often, we will both have several books going at one time: a non-fiction, a theology book, and a novel.

For me, this summer so far it is “Night,” “Here I Stand,” and “So Brave, Young, and Handsome.” My son has read and reread “Do Hard Things” and “Still Growing” and the “Black,” “Red,” “White” series.

I’m now subjecting my daughter to this craziness. She’s reading “Call of the Wild,” for fun, “The Penderwicks” for a book club, and “Pedro’s Journal” to prepare for school next year.

Without question, daily reading for the entire family is the Bible. “No Bible, no breakfast,” as John Piper says.

I am reminded of sharing this passion for books with my mother as I was growing up. For several years we lived on a farm in Alabama and the only access to books was through the periodic visits of the Book Mobile. She would show me her stack and I would show her mine and we would decide which ones we wanted to switch after one or the other was finished with it. Then we would discuss the characters and plots. My children and I do the same.

This is cherished time involving books. I know it’s already mid-summer, but it’s not too late to treat yourself to a page-turner, as well as to instill the joy of reading a compelling story in your children. A summer involving reading good books is not a summer wasted.