These contrasts always fascinate me - the sharp geometry of human architecture/engineering, and the ever-changing fluidity of clouds in the sky/the natural world. We like to impose order (of course, the bridge would be a tad nerve-racking if it wasn't so trustworthily geometric - probably a lot less safe!), for all sorts of reasons. And order can be pleasing in its own way too - you have only to think of the aesthetic of the Shakers.
I was talking with friends today about our books - we're all readers and have houses furnished with bookshelves. I asked them if they ever culled their books - they recoiled! Books are memories made visible, memories to consult - no, they don't cull.
There are many books in this house. Most I can't/won't cull. But looking over the shelves, I see a few - not many, but some - that I could now send on their way and not especially miss, or so I think. When I've moved house, the removalists are always astonished at the number of books here - apparently many more than most (subtext: normal!) people. I find a fairly bookless house unnerving - but then, I've always been a reader. It's genetic....
So in spring cleaning and imposing that order on the house, some books will go. But most are like those clouds, part of an ever-changing landscape of memory and imagination, part of where I've been and where I am and where I'm going, too precious to part with.
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1 comment:
I tried culling mine a year ago, but the best I could do was fill one box, which I still haven't parted with! LOL
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