
I Buy Books Like My Hair's On Fire
My longest bookshelves sag a bit. We should have made the them shorter or – as my husband probably thinks but is far too smart to say – I should buy fewer books.
I counted. Right this minute, there are 1,281 books in our house. Granted, three of them are borrowed, and eight are in a box to be donated to our lovely local library for its monthly used book sale, because, like people, as much as you might want to, you just can’t love them all. But that’s still 1,270 books I have faith I will want to keep.
I buy books like my hair’s on fire. I get wind of a new Elizabeth Strout or Michael Chabon novel, and it’s stop, drop, and roll … straight to a virtual shopping cart or to the list in my notes app where I save up titles to buy from our town’s precious indie bookstore.
Some people I know read on tablets or listen to audibles and buy hardcovers of the stories they love as souvenirs for display in their homes, clues to their personalities – as visible as a slogan on a t-shirt or a bumper sticker. Other friends restrict themselves to a finite number of books for lack of space or, I don’t know, maybe to show that they can be disciplined in love.
Me, I have an infinite capacity for the written word. Every book matters – and if not to me (hence, that donation box of books), then to someone else. There’s always something I need to know, and I trust writers to be honest and far-seeing, to be sharing a piece of information or insight I cannot live without knowing. You find yourself in books, where you might be wrong, where you fit in with the rest of the world, why the rest of the world acts the way it does. Having many – and a diversity – of books is a form of insulation from confusion and fear.
We didn’t have much money when I was a kid, but somehow our parents found a way to buy a handful of books you might consider age-appropriate but which are weirdly sophisticated: Bambi, Black Beauty, Call of the Wild, each packed with tragedy. Characters are tortured, traumatized, they die, although in the end, a measure of justice emerges. Most of our books were hand-me-downs from grandparents, aunts, uncles. Made no difference to me: I was indiscriminate, ate them all as if they were candy, read them over and over again, even the sad ones, when there was nothing new to be found on the shelves.
At school, I lived for study hour in the library. I read biographies in alphabetical order, steadily working my way from shelf to shelf, top to bottom. In the summers, our father’s single kindest act was driving me to the public library where I was allowed to check out seven books at a time. I went through the children’s section in a flash and found a librarian who looked the other way when I started borrowing books from the adult section.
I used to buy books only when I was in danger of running out, but as soon as I had a job that could support my habit, I lifted that restriction. Of the 1,281 books in my house, 136 are waiting in line, and I feel rich! Sustained! I can go YEARS without running out of new stories! I stand in front of a stack of to-be-reads as if it were a bakery counter, trying to choose which to start next. I am optimistic about every single book; there’s almost nothing as delicious as the moment of anticipation when you open it, slowly turn the copyright page, maybe a table of contents or dedication, and land on page one and the first sentence.
Books are safe – and safety nets. People make a lot more sense on paper. They’re very quiet, they make no sudden moves. You know exactly what they’re thinking, so you know what to be on the lookout for. Everything you need to know about life is in a book somewhere. The fact that it’s vicarious does not dilute the experience of knowing. No one in fiction is truly tortured or traumatized or dies, because they’re just ink on paper. By the same token, no one in a book is telling you what to do or judging you or rejecting you. So the books I buy are a comfort, a brimming font of consolation in a troubled world, a guarantee that for as long as I’m living in their pages, I’ll be okay. The sheer quantity of the books surrounding me are exquisite padding of my own choosing.
13 May 2024
Image: On the occasion of my third birthday, with my sweet brother, not quite two years old. I've received every book since this one with the same sense of wonder.