Armchair Travels

I love Thursdays.

Every week I prance into the bone-chilling Victory Home warehouse (gotta keep moving or risk freezing in place) and dump out boxes of donated books, and sort through them, and slap colored stickers on them (we use a color-coded pricing system), and on Thursdays I send them over to the thrift store.

Sometimes I can't get them onto the shelves before customers pounce on the boxes. And that's okay - after all, as much as I enjoy displaying all those fascinating covers, the point is to sell 'em.

On Wednesdays, all books are 1/2 price, so by Thursday morning the shelves are virtually empty. And an empty bookshelf is a sad bookshelf.

I have no idea what that last sentence means.

So...today a kindred spirit showed up. She collected every OLD book she could put her hands on, so I said, "I see you like old books."

"Oh, I LOVE them. My whole house is filled with them," she gushed.

"Ooooh, me too; I love to decorate with them," I said, and she agreed. We both love to decorate in the colors of old books, too - faded reds, browns, olive-y greens....

And don't even get me started on the reading of old books...well, okay, maybe just a comment or two...

I can hardly pick up a contemporary book - those old books have spoiled me. And some of my favorites have turned out to be lesser known works of authors whose names I've always heard, and whose most well known books I've probably never read.

Lost Horizon by James Hilton is an all-time favorite of mine, but I also enjoy his other books, especially an unassuming one called Time and Time Again, about a real average joe with an un-average twist at the end.

Jack London is known for Call of the Wild and White Fang, neither of which I've read, but I really loved his book Smoke Bellew. It would make an awesome movie.

The Pearl of Orr's Island was written by Harriet Beecher Stowe, the author of Uncle Tom's Cabin. It was a beautifully Christian book, and it made me bawl. I HAVE read the first couple of chapters of Uncle Tom's Cabin, but...well, the print was so small...

I was transported into another world with Rudyard Kipling's book Kim (the name of the boy main character). And I've seen the Disney movie of his famous book, so there's no reason to read that one.

And then there's Silas Marner and The Mayor of Casterbridge, and ewwwww...Tess of the D'Urbervilles - don't read that unless you're a glutton for punishment or like the look of really puffy eyes. And if you're like me, you will be really, really angry and you may or may not throw the book into the toilet.

So run on down to Victory Home Thrift Store (or, if you must, a thrift store near you) and grab up a handful of very old, beat up books. Then make yourself a cup of tea, open a box of Junior Mints and stuff a throw pillow behind your back.

Happy reading!