What is owning a book?

I always feel the need to own books, the books I want. I guess therein lies the reasoning. First is utilitarian, I simply don’t read quickly. I’ve tried the library once before in a city I no longer reside, I owe them money! Sure, I didn’t steal anything, but I returned them quite late. $60 or something insane. I just can’t walk in there anymore, no matter. Point being, library rentals don’t suit me, I need to own them.

But there’s another piece to it. I like hardcovers if I have a say, and if there’s a decent used book online for an appropriate price. But do I need the physical copies? Once they’re done, where do they go? Well, on shelves I suppose, a mere handful perhaps may be read again, but it’s doubtful that will be the case, by me anyway. Perhaps a visitor to flip through, or future children may look and find interest in the same handful. Perhaps the very opposite, and those same kids will be tasked with tossing them, donating them, having to carry the many boxes of them to which no one has opened in decades. They’ll move from storage unit, to basement, to attic, straining the backs of all the children and their spouses and then their children until someone claims them, reads them, or donates them.

Why purchase a physical book when you can buy most of them online for $2.99. Hell, some buy the audio book now. The author reads the entire thing to you. Podcasts are becoming the death of society here. While I enjoy them, they’re utterly endless. You can throw away an entire day listening to podcasts, it’s wild. Listen all day to a person, or people regurgitating the same information from a documentary you can simply watch instead. But no, we feel the need to listen to faceless personalities comment on the ordeal, like sports announcers. We can’t think for ourselves anymore, so we need a cute, soft-edged voice to tell us how to feel about the thing we’ve seen or heard about. Podcasts are wild.

Some like the physical nature of books, I know I do. The price point does make it tough though, $2.99 versus $12, $14, sometimes $20+? Hmm. It makes a person wonder. But is it the same? The information is, but the intake isn’t. I guess that’s why. I like a page flip, a makeshift bookmark from a business card I no longer have any use for, and perhaps never did. Why do people feel the need to print them out? Does anybody even carry wallet space for them? Wallets are quickly becoming a thing of the past.

I don’t read as much as I should, although I’ve read more in the last three years than ever. When I finish one, I feel a great sense of accomplishment, that’s why in the end. When I slap that book shut, (Hence the hardback) it feels good. BAM, done. Back on the shelf, for all the imaginary people I invite over to see, as if there actually were anyone. As if anyone who did come would even notice them, or vocally display their admiration about the eclectic readings.

It’s a funny thing, reading, books that is. You’re educating yourself, but it’s also a time commitment, our most valuable resource. Time is always of the essence. My attention span is so limited, always was, that if I read a few chapters of something that’s utterly boring, (to me) I can’t finish it. It hasn’t happened often, but it does. Time is precious. But many of us spend it reading books to pass the time. It’s an odd thing.