The mail person has been delivering a lot of books to my
door in the last month or so. Since my summer classes ended in late July, I have
bought eight secondhand books through the Amazon marketplace where it’s often
possible to purchase an older cloth copy for less money than a recent paper
edition. That’s why I have so many discarded books from libraries. These recent
additions bring my total number of books to something like 933.
At the same time, as I moved a bookcase out of the bedroom,
I discarded about twenty books, mostly old textbooks and took them to
Half-Price Books, thinking that I might get something like thirty or forty
dollars for all of them, when I was only offered $8.00. Some of them couldn’t
be used, the clerk said, because they were instructor editions. When I tried to
take back the books that they kept aside, thinking that I could donate them to
the library, the clerk wouldn’t let me have them and said that the quoted offer
included those books they could sell and those books that would be recycled.
Although I have found a few good books at Half-Price Books over the years, my
experiences have largely been disappointing when I try to sell books to them.
They offer too little money, yet they charge what seems to be the standard
$7.99 for books that they sell. There is a section of the store that is set
aside for discounted books, many of them going for only a few dollars, but I
haven’t found many things that I want in that section. I have resolved not to
return. Any books that I don’t want anymore will either be donated to the local
library or to the students who hold an annual book sale at the college where I
teach.
I have decided not to buy any more books for the foreseeable
future. Not counting the books that are stacked on top of bookshelves, I have
twenty-six shelves of books in my home office. Another sixty books are stacked
on one of the dressers in the bedroom. I have thought about replacing one of my
smaller three-shelf bookcases with one containing six shelves but haven’t yet
made the trip to Surplus Exchange, a warehouse of used office furniture in
Kansas City, Missouri.
Having so many books is one of the hazards associated with
my profession—that is, working as a college professor. I used to admire the
books that my professors had in their offices whenever I visited them during
their office hours. The creative writing professors, I noticed, usually had
fewer shelves stuffed with books.
Not all of my books relate to my academic discipline. At one point as an undergraduate, I was torn
between pursuing English or history as my academic discipline. That interest in
history continues to this day, with the 19th century American West,
particularly the Great Plains, as a research interest of mine. Because I also
seek to introduce my students to those environmental issues that can affect their
lives and their health, I pursue such things as plastic, garbage, and the problems
associated with processed food in my reading. Some of my students recently have
been writing about makeup, so I decided to get a copy of Not Just a Pretty
Face, a book that addresses the chemicals found in makeup. Once I read that
book, I plan on creating one or two research questions for an upcoming essay
assignment.
Despite the number of books that I own, I still think of
myself as a minimalist. I resist buying unnecessary stuff and have given away some of the clutter in my life. Each year, my wife and I declare a
sizeable donation of furniture and clothing on our federal tax return. One task
we haven’t yet faced this year, however, is cleaning out the garage. It is
something that we hope to get to.
Beginning in July, my wife and I have pledged not to buy any
more clothes and any more shoes for an entire year. We have both gone through
our closets and our drawers and donated some of our excess. I will have more
things to donate once I make the time to go through what I have and can face
those tough decisions about what to keep and what to get rid of.
One thing that I would most like to get rid of is more of
our DVD’s and VHS tapes. I don’t think I need documentaries like Wal-Mart: The
High Cost of Low Price, Fahrenheit 9/11, or Sicko anymore, for example.
