I am well-known as a bookworm, and frequently show off my over-the-top home library, which is 5,000+ volumes strong. This serves as my nerd bona fides while establishing rapport with kindred spirits and calming the fears of those who view me as disturbingly peculiar: unveiling my book fetish puts folks off the scent of all the other fetishes I'd just as soon stay private.
But since I've been self-disclosing this week in order to bond with you all, I need to confess a few things about the books.
I haven't read them all. I haven't even read half of them. Certainly more than 1/4. Possibly 1/3. Definitely not half. My official excuse for this is that most are non-fiction and secured as reference materials for my own writing, so I don't read them so much as I look stuff up in them. This is true, but the deeper truth is that books-as-resource are Green Lantern's ring, Spider-Man's webs, Wonder Woman's lasso to me: they make me feel stronger.
Okay, what I just said was intended to sound cool, but the more accurate version is that my library is Linus's blanket. My books soothe my insecurities. When I am self-doubting, I glance over at my bound copies of the Feynman Lectures or Weinberg's trilogy or the Hofstadter shelf and I feel comforted that I can possess such friends.
The world both fascinates and frightens me, and always has. If you were to visit my home, the appalling excess would startle you, but you would soon note that my bookcases form walls all around most rooms. My library is just that - walls, within which I feel safe, protected from the banshee howls of ignorance out there.
My books connect me to my past. I seldom discard a book; it would be like discarding a zygote. I only shed volumes like outdated tech books, and even those I often retain for the memories (I still have my first computer architecture textbook, which is almost 40 years out of date). I am now an atheist, but I have preserved my extensive theology library. As a music and film critic of decades, I have hoarded all my books of pop history, biography and criticism, no matter how quaint.
I take pride in my mind - it's the only thing about me that adds value to the world - and my library makes that feel okay to me. Insecure? Sure. But I can say that to you, you're my friends.
I thrive on the new and different, and I have created a private world where I can walk into any room, peruse, and in 30 seconds begin reading a book I don't even remember buying that will offer me a new idea or thought to play with.
All but a couple of the women I've loved think the library is hot.
(Why is he telling us this?)
I'm telling you this because I'm not the only one here with insecurities. We ALL have insecurities, and we all compensate in different ways. We all create corners of fantasy in our heads that project the conceit that how we wish it was is how it actually is. My own insecurities once embarrassed me deeply, but I came to realize that our corners of fantasy are to insecurity as animal skins are to the winter cold; they protect us when we need protecting. I don't need to be embarrassed about feeling vulnerable to the cold.
Whatever it is you do for yourself, in your most private thoughts, to find comfort and refuge and a reminder of who you are, indulge it. Embrace it. Share it or not, but don't let go of it.
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