Yes. Yes, I do. I can't explain it, I can't really logically justify it...I need all those books right there where I can look at them and feel the weight of their words and knowledge and stories and wisdom. It makes this place my Home and it makes me feel at peace.

Yes. Exactly.

I would love to keep them all, but I just can't. There isn't room. But mostly, I don't get rid of any book till I've read it twice.

Yes. Yes, I do. I can't explain it, I can't really logically justify it...I need all those books right there where I can look at them and feel the weight of their words and knowledge and stories and wisdom. It makes this place my Home and it makes me feel at peace.

Yup.

Though in recent past I've been able to go to my shelves, pull down three or four books, and give someone a complete answer with example and citations for some school work. "Oh!," they gasped. "It's just like a real library!"

Uh, yeah.

Seriously, you guys, don't leave your books at your parents'. They disappear before you have the chance to get them.

"We figured you didn't want them anymore. Anyway, they were all old."

My parents keep books I'd happily burn for warmth after running from the frost.

They didn't throw away anything I didn't take out of the house. Some is charmingly nostalgic, and some is a reminder of how crap my taste was.

I'm not much of a book-keeper myself. If it's not non-fiction, I have to like it a real lot to hang on.

Seriously, you guys, don't leave your books at your parents'.

Unless it is my parents' house.

The way they cull books when the shelves get full? They send them to me. Or to my aunts who eventually send them to me.

I'm now officially out of bookshelf space and wall space for bookshelves.

I think I may start sending some to a friend with very similar reading tastes.

I read more words than I ever have, I bet, and fewer books.

This. Between school, comics, and fanfic, far less of what I read comes in bound, made-of-paper, non-illustrated form. But overall, I'm reading far more.

Though in recent past I've been able to go to my shelves, pull down three or four books, and give someone a complete answer with example and citations for some school work. "Oh!," they gasped. "It's just like a real library!"

Uh, yeah.

A friend of mine was talking about Borders' summer reading list (buy three, get one free), and how she was just noting the names of the books so she could read them. She mentioned On the Road, and I said, "Oh, I have that," and grabbed it for from the bookshelf. Then she said Siddhartha, and I said, "I have that too," and got it for her as well. It was pretty awesome.

I need all those books right there where I can look at them and feel the weight of their words and knowledge and stories and wisdom.

It's like we're crows and books are shiny things.