On my Kindle, at night and in the afternoon, I am reading a book about various birds that have gone extinct and how it happened. So many at one time that they darkened the sky, yet hunting for food and feathers and destroying habitat decimated the flocks til there were none. I went to this book after reading about it in a devotion paper and print book that I held in my hand by morning light. Both ways of reading are my life blood. By my choices will there soon be only one option?
In the last few years, high schools in our area have increased their digital libraries for space and rapidity of use. No more wandering stacks for a surprise or knowing how to search a card catalogue for a Dewey Decimal number. Four years ago we moved to a smaller house, and I weeded books that occupied shelves. A few were cradled gently and opened naturally to a oft visited page. I can even tell where some favorite books were read as on the iron bed on a screen porch in Hammond, or the ones that traveled to Holland with me as a paperback.
I caught my breath when I went to help sort books as our church library closed. We went almost every Sunday when our children were small. Users has lessened, and the space was needed. Some books are being kept. We are trying to find homes in schools and other churches for the rest.
A small respite survives with children’s books. The time may come when sitting on a parent’s lap and turning pages by swiping is the norm. If the change is a fault, it is partly mine. I try not to buy shelf bound books. A friend passes books sideways, and then I return them. If I do buy they go back through Half-Price or Good Will. Sometimes the desire to know now is strong enough to purchase if the internet or a library fail to quench the yearning. Maybe I need to make a bumper sticker: “If you can read this, go buy a book!”
To everything there is a season, A time for every purpose under heaven.
Ecclesiastes 3:1
Let Me Tell Ya 