The Treachery of Books

Books - those pesky word filled mind defying chameleons.

I enjoy reading. I enjoy having opinions about what I read. I enjoy posting my opinions about what I read on Goodreads.  I like archiving what I've read and what I thought of it in a neat orderly fashion.

On my currently reading bookshelf has been a book that I haven't been able to finish. Why? I lost it. I've looked everywhere for it. I've called all over town for it. I'd finally resigned myself to my fate. I'd left it at a doctor's office. A nice little surprise for someone who didn't have the foresight to bring their own reading material and finds a bonus sitting unassumingly next to them. Inside the book there is no name no address, nothing to identify it's owner. So some patient weary with waiting takes the treasure home and leaves me to wonder at its loss. This, I was sure, was what had happened to my absent reading material.

In the meantime I'm at home tearing my house apart. Cleaning out closets, dismantling beds searching to find what very likely was no longer in my house.

I've been updating the status of this book on Goodreads. Finally, in resignation, I updated my status one last time today. I said that I have to borrow the book from the library, or buy it again. Oh, the agony! Rebuying a book I already had! Borrowing a book that was once mine! I finish my post, and sigh. Slowly I get up. I turn. I look at the book shelves that stand in a row in my family room. I decide to give it one last look. I've looked through the books on the shelf so many times. I know it isn't there, but I look anyway.

There it is. In the corner, on the bottom shelf. Hiding. Concealing itself. Camouflaged from notice. Innocently looking like a book amongst many books. Apparently it wasn't too anxious to be read or it would not have so cleverly disguised itself like that.

Some well meaning person had evidently found it lying around the house somewhere and attempted to put it away. The audacity! How dare they! Putting things away like that!

And not with the other Biographies and memoirs where it was supposed to be, but right next to the pop up books!!! Now how is a person supposed to find a biography among pop up books? Not only that but there was a religious book installed next to it! How is a person supposed to function in this disorder?? Taking a closer look at the shelves I see the problem is running rampant. There are self help books in the novels and song books in with the comics. How can one endure???


Obviously the possibility that I have too many books cannot be true. The blame cannot lie in the innocent habit of collecting, hording and cataloguing them. Clearly the fault is with the person who touched my books! TOUCHED my BOOKS!!!!

My book was lying there, obviously being read, it had a book mark in it! It was being currently and actively read!! Is there no sanctity in the home? Is there no peace to be had in one's own dwelling? Why must one be subjected to nefarious acts of BOOK TOUCHING?????? How can I finish a book when it isn't left where I had placed it?

Oh! Pity me!