"And the Walls Came A-Tumbling Down"

Ten days ago, I wrote this:

“I have always liked to have my books on shelves (or at least in drawers) so that they would be somewhat available. But now I’m thinking about … well, not selling any books, but maybe putting some up in bins, thinning the herd as it were, to get easier access to what remains.

“This would be an enormous undertaking, and very finicky if done correctly. Every bin would have to be catalogued and labeled so I could find what had been put away more easily. Books would probably have to be grouped according to size, not subject matter, and that would discomfort my fussy nature, like an itch at the back of the brain. And where would I put the bins? My little house is already almost stacked to the gills.

“Anyway, it seems to be growing into one of those restless Fall projects.”

Yesterday (Sept. 19), at approximately 8:45 AM, the Universe gave me a goosing as a bit of a prod to get on with it. With a sudden crash and a clatter, two shelves of a five-shelf bookcase came tumbling down. Fortunately, there was nothing breakable on them (mostly Pogo figures and Crest animals) though the box with my Harry Potter light-up wand may have got a new nick in it. Happily, none of the books landed badly or with bent pages. Those two shelves had always been a bit precarious and needed careful loading (only one of them had had a half a line of books). Now that one shelf was (as far as I could tell) totally out of commission.

My heart sank and I could feel the fluid draining from my spine in dread and weariness. I picked everything up and moved it out of the way as best I could. I could do nothing about it right away; my niece Kelsey was coming over to hang out with me and Kameron. We spent the day watching the first two volumes of The Groovie Goolies; I had shared the show with them when they were younger and now it was part of their childhood nostalgia. As we shmoozed and nattered and looked up trivia (Who did that voice? Who was that character based on?) my ruffled spirits were smoothed. But there was always going in the back of my head: where can I move these books? How can I get this all set up again?

When Kelsey left at 3 PM, we noticed Susan sitting out sunning herself, trying to dry up her running sinuses. We all went over to talk to her. I took the opportunity to talk to her about plastic bins. As it turns out she had forty extra left over from her Great Cleansing and was more than happy to let me have four of them to use for my sorting. Maybe not this weekend, but soon. So that obviates any extra expense. Thank Heaven (and Susan). Storage is beginning to get mighty costly.

I spent most of the evening reshuffling things and patching up what I could. It inevitably reminded me of the Mad Tea Party, with everyone moving one space down to get into new seats. At last, by 9 PM things were, if not settled down where I imagine they ultimately will be, at least in such order that my mind could rest for the night. Everything was a bit cleaner and better organized. I had had a lot of Dana Gould on the YouTube while I worked, and I was in a more jovial mood. Altogether the day ended on a better note than I could have imagined when it began.

Here's how the shelf looks now:

Compared to some of the shelves I see on fancy podcasts and videos, it looks like the efforts of some mad sort of cargo cult, but it fulfills my needs for the moment.