My Favorite Game

I'm not much of a board game player. And days of playing baseball or dodge ball or soccer are, well, over.

My current very favorite game? It's one I like to call Rearranging All My Books.

Gee, I love that game. 

I play Rearranging All My Books in the mornings when a certain energy hits me to reorganize. 

I keep my books shelved in four categories: Kids' Lit., Teen Lit., Adult Lit. and Reference and when I play this game, I remove one category of books from a set of shelves over to another. I place them in high stacks all over the floor then try to place them in the same alphabetical order when the books reach their new shelves.


Sometimes I hold each book and try to recall where I bought it and for how much. I reread the sentimental India ink inscriptions from long ago and wonder what journey happened for this book to be laying in my hands 80 years later.

I ask myself, "Should I reread this soon? Or do I already have the plot of this story memorized?" Or, "Is this book a keeper? Is it worth taking up space on my shelves?" If the answer is, "probably not," I place it inside a bag for Salvation Army or for Naomi to sell on Ebay.

Sometimes I will  dust my books, but fortunately, since they sit behind glass, they don't often need that. Yet most of my books are pretty old, so nearly always my fingers end up with that book dust feeling, anyway. I'm used to it--every thrift shop I go to, I search through books and come away with book dust.

Rearranging All My Books is a perfect game. At its end, I'm usually a little sweaty, I've lost some calories, but I'm smiling because I've paddled around in my sea of books--and enjoyed the swim.

Hmmm... do you think I could be a bibliophile?



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