You know what I'm talking about.
That constant stream of photos that do the rounds on social media, attracting drooling "likes", adoring retweets, and gushing comments:
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| OMG IT'S A PACMAN SHELF CAUSE PACMAN WAS RENOWNED FOR HIS LOVE OF CHERRIES & BOOKS |
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| It's a bookshelf that says READ, because that's insightful and encouraging, you know? |
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| I'm going to get a pointy house just so I can build this! |
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| ARGHGHGH IT'S A POD A READING POD SO ERGONOMIC |
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| It's an ideas tree, can you FEEL your creativity GROWING? Also books are made of trees so it's like a life cycle. |
I realise I sound like a bitter illiterate (billiterate?) sow, but honestly, have you people never heard of dust?
Sure, these bookshelves are marvellously creative and appeal to our collective sense of whimsy, but let's think of the practicalities.
You show me one of these bookshelves IN REAL LIFE, and I'll show you a warren of so many dust bunnies you could re-enact Watership Down.
Honestly, all these internet people with fancy bookshelves must live in hermetically sealed, climate controlled environments, where no dust can permeate.
Or maybe they clean regularly or something. Whatever.
All I know is that it seems sometimes that these pictures appeal to people because they fancy themselves as "book people".
You know, the kind of people who imagine themselves as thoroughly literate types, with iced tea and organic mini-muffins on hand as they tuck themselves into their bohemian book nook to take in the latest insert 'posh' or 'cred' author here.
Bless you, if you are one of those people. I often wish I could be like you. You probably wash your hair in pure mountain streams and knit your own hemp trousers. All very admirable, until your allergies play up from all the dust collecting on your stack of Frankie magazines.
Me? I'm trying to clear out books from Chez Clumsy. I've got too many. Of course there are a few favourite fictions and cherished non-fictions that I'll always hold onto, but the vast majority have no re-read value. They're just dust collectors.
Before you slam me as having no romance in my soul, please remember that bagging books does not mean I'm bagging reading.
I bought myself an iPad before heading to Burma last year, and I can tell you that the main thing I've used it for is reading eBooks. The damn thing's a bloody marvel. I don't even have to dog-ear a page to remember where I'm up to. THE iPAD REMEMBERS.
And sure, while the first books I read on it were Stieg Larsson's Millenium Trilogy, followed by A Clash of Kings (aka Game of Thrones Series 2), I have just finished Hilary Mantel's Bring Up the Bodies, and that's PROPER literary.
Also, you can't get paper cuts from iPads. Paper cuts frighten me on a level only topped by geckos. Just consider this for a moment: getting a paper cut ON YOUR EYEBALL.
Yeah.
I once thought of that, and then almost vomited. The thought has haunted me ever since. I shouldn't even write it here, lest the mere noting of the fear helps it manifest in the form of outraged hemp-knitting, Frankie devotees baying for my blood in between cups of dandelion tea.
Point is - is it OK to not like having books around the place anymore? Have I completely lost my soul because I want less dust in my house?
