Confession of a Book Hoarder

Being the post-modern consumer that I am expected to be, I’ve always counted on retail therapy as the quintessential method of avoiding mental glitches*

*: inexplicable sentimentality that involves listening to Joni Mitchell’s Cloud album from beginning to end, OR inexplicable rage that involves considering to join a Fight Club for the prospect of beating up a bleached Jared Letto).

I've only read ONE of the books in this pile. Ay Carumba! (illustration via http://www.iliketodrawthings.com/)

I’m sure there’s a long tedious intellectual discourse to argue how void/materialist/futile/greedy/etc  it is to let ‘what you buy‘ influence ‘how you feel about yourself/your life‘.

But if we go down to brass-tacks, the fact is:

Impulsive shopping is called a therapy for 2 reasons yo!

1. It makes you feel good, like a therapy should.

2. It sucks the money out of your account, like a therapy would.  (That Freud guy was a unsung business man!)

HAHA.

So, I’ve acknowledge this tendency, or let’s say vice if you want, and I’ve been thinking about it. And by thinking I’m refering “trying to come up with proper justification to minimize the guilt that usually comes at home after calculating how much I’ve spent on this overpriced - but cute! – dress that I would possibly wear only once – but cute!“.

And my resolution was: Should the unsurpressable urge to shop comes, direct your path to the nearest book stores!

It’s better to buy books (from which one can learn new things, experience an imaginary journey, etc) than clothes or shoes or bags.

AMIRIGHT?AMIRIGHT?AMIRIGHT?

This realization + rapidly decreasing attention span  = a long, long, loonngg bucket list of books to read cluttering all over my bed room.

To wit:

Books I’ve read more than 50% of it but then lost interest,but made a half-assed promise to finish:

• Middlesex – Jeff Euginides
• Virgin Suicide – Jeff Euginides
• The Adventure of Kavalier and Clay – Michael Chabon
• The Yiddish Policemen Union – Michael Chabon
• One Fifth Avenue – Candace Bushnell (I know, what the hell, right??)

Books I’ve been reading, very interested in, but for some reason haven’t finished yet:

• Seymour : An Introduction – JD Salinger
• Brideshead Revisited – Evelyn Waugh

Freshly-bought book:

• Slaughterhouse Five – Kurt Vonnegut Jr
• Catch 22 – Joseph Heller
• Tender is the Night – F.Scott Fitzgerald

Books that I bought ages ago but haven’t read more than a chapter:

• The Pittsburgh Mystery – Michael Chabon (Damn what is it with my non-committment to Michael Chabon’s books? I really, really enjoyed Wonder Boys immensely and decided to buy more of his works but they’re not like what I expected)

Borrowed book that I haven’t finished:

• The Gourmet Rhapsody – Muriel Barberry

How am I going to finish them all???