I collect books. The free ones that the library is throwing away. The cheapos in the bargain bin. Hand me downs from friends. Smut, college texts, poetry anthologies,aeronautics stuff, 1960s sci-fi.You leave a box of books out for recycling and I may just take the whole thing.
I meant to read all those books. The problem was with a full time and part time job, countless volunteering positions, a family, friends, and being a military spouse, I ran out of time. The books piled up without leaving. Even more came in.My husband joked that the house would go up in flames if it hit my library first.
When the movers came, I was more concerned with the furniture and the dinnerware from my grandmother than the shelves of random books. I eventually came to regret it.
Since we were not going to hit our weight limit and we only had 30 days notice to PCS, I thought we could wait for the new duty station before sorting through the books. I did not realize what a pain that would be or how my priorities would change.
At the new location, there was no housing where my husband was to work. The architecture of our house was designed for people who apparently didn't own furniture or TVs or books.
Aside from the heartbreak when my furniture came ruined but not destroyed, what ended up being a thorn in my side was where to put those stupid books. With the furniture set up in less than ideal patterns, none of the books, either those I was dead set on keeping or the tossers, seemed to fit. Even the keepers in the books shelves weren't going in right!
Everything was getting to me. So I told myself: Take a breath. Moving is hard. The books shelves went in a less than ideal spot but I did not want to pull the books down, again, dismantle the shelves, again, and move it all, again. So I separated the tossers into teetering columns and left them to be dealt with while the bedrooms were finalized.
When job hunting proved harder than I had anticipated and the rejections came rolling in, I decided it was time to attack the towers of books I had separated out. After I read a tosser, the privilege of putting it in the recycle bin fell to the hubby who was more than happy to throw those things out after having packed and moved all those books DITY a few times.
I was determined that no matter what jobs or volunteering cropped up, those books were not coming with us again unless I was absolutely going to reread them. Except those recipe books, those are off limits!
Christina is a proud war bride, military “dependent,” writer,and volunteer. She met her husband while working two jobs and he stuck with the despite the long and crazy hours away from each other. And so began her experience with the military. Scrapping the wedding for a long and dangerous deployment, she fully embraced being a military spouse. Christina reaches out to all available networks to learn and take advantage of what the military has to offer its family.
