Sorting Through the Books

Alternately titled: Wherein I Reveal Deep-Seated Prejudices and Rant and Rave like a Crazy Old Man

I am entirely enthralled by home-improvement shows on TV right now. Mostly because I'm moving in a couple of weeks and love the idea of hidden potential in ordinary spaces. I've spoken about my love of Sell This House recently, but the best place for me to get my fix (anytime that I'm jonesing, day or night) is the HGTV, a channel I previously didn't even know existed. But now that I have found it, I love it unconditionally. It could be 3:30 in the morning on a Friday, but you can tune in and watch some fool trying to update a bedroom by spackling a mirror to the front of his dresser. It is a flawless way to waste a couple of hours.

Also? Carpenters are wicked hot. (Not the point of this post)

My rant-filled issue is only marginally related to this, but it's the jumping-off point. One of the shows that HGTV uses as filler during the day is called Operation: Organization, or something similar. Basically, they find some poor homeowner who is a complete slob and then spend thousands and thousands of dollars to get their place all organized and classy. Until the second the cameras leave and they go back to their old slobbish ways, I assume.

It's sort of a cool show because the transformations are so dramatic. Since you start out with papers and crap everywhere, the end result is amazing. The problem I have is with one of the professional organizers that they use. They have a whole stable of go-to people (Flamboyant Asian Guy, Strict British Girl, etc.) but the most used one is a Type-A Woman who is super effective at getting shit done. She cuts through all the crap and gets things organized ridiculously quickly, with her specialty being convincing people to throw away/donate stuff that they don't really need. This ability speaks deeply to me because I am horrible about throwing anything away. I envy her power so hard.

My issue, though? She hates books. Hates them. Every time she starts the sorting process, the second they get to a book shelf she starts throwing as many books as possible into the donation pile. "If you've already read it, there's no reason to keep it around taking up space. Donate it to someone else who can get some use out of it." This is like her mantra.

Never has such an innocuous comment inspired such rage in me.

The worst was when she was working with this one family with three kids. Despite the fact that she had no problem keeping something like 4 chests full of lame toys, she totally took this mom to task for wanting to keep her books, even though she had already read them. When the mom said something like "Well, every one of these books I have read at least twice," the organizer looked all disbelieving and snorted "Well, you're not going to read them a third time, right?" All the while staring at the husband with a look that clearly said "How d'you get hooked up with this nutball?"

White hot rage. Made even hotter by the fact that this is a very common belief. If you've managed to get through a book once, there could never be a reason to go back again. Arg.

Books are meant to be read multiple times. They are not the sole entertainment medium in the world that is one-use only. No one ever suggests that once you've seen a movie or listened to an album you've gotten all the use you'll get out of it you'll ever need. DVDs, CDs, these things are collected in bulk by everyone. Why? Because you can get plenty of enjoyment from repeat uses.

The same is true with a book, too. There are books I own that I have read literally dozens of times. Are they less enjoyable in the later times? No less so than watching your favorite movie or listening to your favorite album years after purchase. The fact that people can't understand this just boggles my mind.

I guess I'm just completely out of step with the rest of the world on this issue. Because seriously.

No wait, actually it goes even deeper than that. Because I hear this constantly and every time I am left completely speechless.

"Well, I just don't read." (And it's a proud declaration, like a blow for human rights or something.)

Nothing in the world, short of telling me that your hobby is Mime, will make me discount your opinions faster than telling me "Oh, I don't read." Bullshit.

Okay, not bullshit, I'm perfectly willing to believe that you don't read. But, what? Seriously, what?

There is just no way I can relate to that. People who are all "I don't watch TV, it rots your mind," I can at least just silently roll my eyes at and move on. But reading? This is a fundamental sort of thing. I'm not even talking the snobbish sort of "You've never read Tolstoy?!" crap. I mean just reading - for enjoyment, for knowledge, for anything.

Lord knows I'm not the most literary person in the world (I just spent the entire weekend reading a 400 page novel about the oral history of the zombie war, for God's sake), but so much of my world-view is colored by the reading I have done. I don't understand how people can say that they've never read a book since high school, and even then they only did it because it was required. This is a level of disconnect that I don't understand at all.

I mean, I know that it is possible to be a well-rounded individual without a background in literature. There are very few things in the world that can only be picked up from a book and those things are even less likely to be real-world necessary. That said, dismissing an entire medium out-of-hand just drives me crazy. Why limit yourself like that? Yeah, some books are boring. Or poorly written, or full of words that you don't know. But there are tons and tons of things out there to read that are hilarious, or thought provoking, informative, or just wildly interesting. And your default setting is to ignore it all?

Why?

I just, ugh. See? Complete disconnect. What is going on there? Were you abused by the written word in your past? Was getting through A Separate Peace in sophomore year really that traumatizing? (Actually, if that's the reason, then I totally have your back. God, I hate John Knowles.) I don't understand and it's making my blood pressure rise trying to figure it out.

Yeah, okay, I've gone on my snob rant long enough. But there it is.

Really, you should read.

But even if you don't, please don't tell me. It makes my brain hurt. So much.