Books

A recent article in my favorite magazine, The Atlantic, talked about the decline of American book reading.  An infographic about books scrolled past me a few weeks ago on Pinterest,  claiming that most Americans read something like one book a year.  In actuality the situation isn't that miserable, but it does appear that book reading, even on e-books is on the decline.  However, book reading isn't on the decline at my house, and I recently set out to do something about our overflow.

My book storage problems are numerous.

 Space -

The bookshelves in our living room, where anyone who comes over sees them were taken up with photographs.  Taking them out and having them scanned is in my long-range plan.  What I need is about a week of snow days when I'm stranded at home with nothing better to do than take photos out of albums and organize them into boxes. Until then I have consolidated photo albums into one book case.

Magazines - 

Magazines and people who won't toss them are also an issue.  How many years of National Geographic's does a family need?

When I taught Sunday School we had a box full of National Geographics that we pulled out when the children had a project that needed pictures. It was fun to look through the magazines in search of a picture of whatever. These may meet that fate.

Cook books - 

My cook book library was edited a few years ago when we had our kitchen re-done. I know that many people like to keep their recipes their iPads, I like cookbooks.  One shelf is all I'll tolerate, although magazines threaten to overrun the cookbooks.

Children's books - 

What do to with children's books?  Chapter books - Goosebumps and the like- have been given away, as well as anything abridged.

I'm hanging onto picture books in hopes that some little ones to read them to will turn up in our lives. They'll have to acquire their own chapter books.

The Stacks - 

In addition to books housed in the living room, TV room, office and every single bedroom, we also have books in the basement. Lots of it is what I'd term pulp fiction.

Yes, there are two shelves of travel books, they're worth keeping, but the rows and rows of mysteries and science fiction books may need new homes.

 More books!

 This shelf threatens to collapse. I hardly dared to move things lest the shelves give way.

The red Churchill series came from my in-laws.  Husband wants to keep those, although he didn't have any suggestions for where they should be housed.

This bookshelf/spray paint can storage unit is staying as is until homes have been found for other books.

 Hanging by a thread.

A step on the road to a solution - 

Eventually I got the shelves in our living and family room cleaned up enough to put books back onto them.  That was the fun part.  I didn't have any trouble grouping books, and I like the groups, they're a narrative of our interests.

Favorite Poet - 

Many of the books came from his parents home. After unearthing 5 copies of poetry by Robert Frost I think it's fair to say that he was a family favorite.   I put them on a shelf with fossils.

Bookends - 

Ever seen a brass stirrup?  It's from Argentina. It's found a new home holding up books.

The dent in the foot part is from a bullet hole. I'm sure it would tell a story if it could.

Regional Crafts - 

I have a number of quilting and country style books. I thought they went well with the brass sunflower that my father cast for me.  When you're from the Kansas you need some sunflowers.

 Faith - 
Bibles and crosses, pictures of family. It's good to have those things in case you need to look something up.

When son went off to college in Southern Maryland he said he was the only person in his history class who knew what the Reformation was.  I guess Maryland Catholics don't cover that on Sunday morning. If you grew up in our home you know about those events.

My Dad cast the cross bookend.

Fathers - 

In his retirement my father cast brass objects, husband's father liked to paint religious icons.

The bronze crosses are miniatures of a large cross my Dad cast for the entrance to the Salvation Army shelter in Topkea.  The miniatures were made for significant donors to the building fund.

The first cross, in the photo above was an early version that had an image of Christ on the cross.
The Salvation Army design committee didn't go for that, so he substituted palm leaves - shown in this photo.

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Here's the big cross in front of the Salvation Army mission in Topeka.  My Dad wasn't a member of the Army, a fellow who ran a foundry that he used to cast things was helping the fund raising effort and got my Dad into creating the cross.

Seafaring Life - 

We're a family that likes the shore.  We had quite a few Patrick  O'Brian novels in the basement but only the favorites came upstairs.

We own a DVD of "Master and Commander." I think it's one of Russell Crow's best movies.  I slip the weather gauge,  phrase I picked up from the book into conversations whenever possible.

"A Captain's Duty" was featured on this blog last year.

Mysteries! - 

While husband likes books about sea captains, I'm a mystery buff.  It's hard to choose my favorites. Since I had the moose pot I started out with books by the Hillerman's. I'm still digging books out of the upstairs, More mysteries, a Sara Paretsky title for sure, will join these.

Human Behavior - 

Last but not least, I'm a social scientist.  I love to read books that look at human behavior.  Maybe that's why I assigned my Grinnell College bookend to hold these books up.  These days I listen to Think Like a Freak podcasts.

The Road Left to be Traveled. 

I've still got books in shelves, closets, under beds, stacked up and stored on my Kindle.  I'm not a re-reader of books so I don't mind getting rid of them, but the notion of assembling representative books and displaying them appeals to me.

I'm thinking of a book club shelf, expanding the travel shelf, and assembling a health shelf from the gazillions of health and diet books that are scattered around.  I think it'll be fun.