Do you collect books like I do?

In ninth grade, my English teacher Mrs. Neff told us we should buy and own books. I took her advice to heart. My father owned books, and they were displayed in shelves in our home. My mother was an avid reader, but she preferred going to the library and borrowing books. She was a child of The Depression, don’t you know?

So, over the years, I began my own collection of books, mostly paperback. I accumulated my college texts, and kept the ones on history and English. I read novels—buying Georgette Heyer, Thomas B. Costain, and Anya Seton. I even began buying the first true historical romances that became popular—The Flame and the Flower by Kathleen Woodiwiss and Sweet Savage Love by Rosemary Rogers.

As my collection grew and grew, I built my own bookshelves—first in the basement and then upstairs flanking the fireplace. My office has two bookshelves. All the shelves were getting crowded. Finally, I decided I needed to cull the quantity and started donating books to Locust Grove for their fundraisers.

Locust Grove is a c.1792 Georgian mansion built by William and Lucy Clark Croghan, near Louisville Kentucky. Lucy Clark Croghan is the sister of Revolutionary War hero General George Rogers Clark. I feel my books have a good home if they go to supporters of this historic mansion.

Yet, my gathering hasn’t stopped. Beginning in April 2010, I bought ebooks. Amazon’s Kindle app fit nicely on my new iPad, and Amazon was so accommodating to allow me to buy with one click and somehow, amazingly, the book appeared on my device—both of them, my iPad and my iPhone.

At lunch now, I walk away from the office, sit at the sandwich shop, and read a book on my iPhone. It is so easy to do today. But I won’t give up my bookshelves of paperback books. I find something comforting about having them around me—like old, faithful friends.