Wednesday, September 26, 2001 6:21:08 PM
Basement - deep in the hole (A glass of Merlot - Bill Evans Conversation with Myself)
Books confound me. There are those who say it is a problem, all these books that I have. I look up, innocent as all get out, I don't, I say slowly and deliberately, go to a saloon and come home a whole lot of sheets to the wind, singing bawdy versions of Walking Your Baby Back Home (Oh did we have the lyrics for that one, or These Foolish Things Remind Me of You, absolutely scandalous the poetry of those lines verbally spit in front of the ship port bathroom window of the Eastwood Show on a hot Friday evening.) I don't spend my paycheck on the lottery! (I am convinced that I will find a legitimate lottery ticket tucked in as a book marker from some obscure volume (perhaps Goethe in Drag) that I purchase from a thift store and will cash it in for a cool couple hundred million. That is the extent of my gambling. In Biloxi MS I did not spend even one quarter on the twinkling machines at the Beau Rivage. I was there for four days for a conference.) I don't take women who are way too young for me out on extravagant dates in hopes of getting laid. (This last I have been considering, but it turns out that books are much more reasonable.) What I hope to get across with all this sophistry is that as a vice, this owning of copious books is low the totem pole. How many Hail Marys?
So, I was at Half Price Books the other day and I see a girl way too young for me putting copies of what looks like the full fifteen volumes of Samuel Eliot Morison’s History of United States Naval Operations in World War II. I have only seen a volume here or there and I own his Two Ocean War Abridgement. I get closer (and yes I did have a sexual fantasy or two, but the ring through her upper lip gave me pause) and there they are - fully dust jacketed. All fifteen! What to do? I can't afford them all! My credit cards grumble in my back pocket. I think heavy, agonize, then buy the first three volumes. I will be back next pay check for three more and in five weeks I will own the set.
It is now three weeks later. I own the set and it happened like this. The following week less than half of the volumes are left. Don’t tell me there aren't others out there with large fangs trying to foil my every move! And, more tragedy, volume four is missing - Coral Sea, Midway and Submarine Actions. I settle for five, six and fourteen. This is not good! I travel, two days later, across the city and see in another location another mall, that there is only one copy of Four (Ahh!), Nine and Fifteen. I grab them! Hold them tight to my breast. My cards sing shrilly and growl as the fluorescent light is revealed, the clink of cash register, the bite of the swipe.
I travel to Columbus, OH, where there are three Half Price Books locations. In one I get all the rest but volume ten and volume thirteen. I am in a collector’s tizzy! Maybe there is something psychologically complex to this ranting book fever that I exhibit. A mad passion that sends me reeling through three stores and two cities.
This morning while running an errand I stopped, heart in my mouth, at the original store and on the shelves are the two remaining volumes. I salivate then sigh. It is a feeling akin to sexual release and possibly the satisfaction of nirvana. The completeness that I feel. There are those that say I have too many books! How many is too many? I'm going to call Heather tonight. Maybe she'll remove the lip ring for one evening.