When I moved to my current apartment, I hired movers, and Eric helped too. Upon picking up a heavy box, which I had hidden in the storage space, he asked, “What is in this?!” Books. Then he asked, “When is the last time you read them?”

The box of books was never opened in my last apartment. I lived there for a year and never felt the need to go digging through the boxes for any of the novels. Yet, it felt great need to pull them all out when I moved into my new place.

I didn’t have a place for them, though, so they stayed piled up in the floor. Eventually, I bought a couple of cheap bookshelves, but this provided a new, elevated space to pile stuff on top.

I just needed time to organize.

Of course, since it wasn’t important to me, I never took the time to organize.

So in my recent efforts of de-cluttering, I took the majority of my books to Half Price Books on Lane Avenue: four boxes full. Some of these books I had toted from Maine. Others had accumulated because I thought I’m going to read this eventually or I should read this some time. Neither of these thoughts came to fruition.

It was time to let go and to stop holding on.

If I really wanted to read the book later, I could get it at the library or read it online. (You can find free e-books at Project Gutenberg – www.gutenberg.org.)

I didn’t know what to expect at Half Price Books, so I wasn’t setting my sights too high; however, I was quite pleased to leave with $35.00.

Unloading books and more books

Getting rid of physical books is not an easy thing to do. Sure, I read e-books on my iPad, but the experience is not the same. I like turning the pages and feeling the paper. However, I thought that my books could do more than collect dust. I thought that someone else may be able to benefit from the information between the covers.

On the same day, I took my box of glasses and mugs, a box of various household items, and two large bags of clothes to Goodwill in Hilliard. Dropping off these items was not time consuming. Total time at Half Price Books was 15 minutes, and the time at the Goodwill donation drive-thru was three minutes.

It felt great to get rid of these things. They filled up most of my car, which is a pretty significant space. I have an incredible, albeit strange, memory for my mugs and glasses; however, I had no real attachment to them. If someone else can create a memory with these things, I will be happy.