censorship

Today I did something most unusual for me. I destroyed a perfectly beautiful as-new book. (I feel my librarian friends' shockwaves from here!)

My two weeks of not working has given me a lot of thinking and reading time. Oddly enough the flu didn't fuzzle my brain too much. I have decided to accept the "down time" as a gift.

On my bookshelf was a book I had bought to read as I flew to my new life. Several people had recommended it, and the volume itself - hard cover, most attractive dust jacket, small enough to go into the hand luggage - was just too seductive to leave on the shelf at the airport bookshop.

I read the book very quickly, totally disillusioned once I got past the attractive quotations and beautifully designed pages. I am sure the writer had the most honourable intentions as she wrote. For me, however, it was not the inspirational book I had been promised. Describing the "law of attraction", this was a book encouraging greed, encouraging consumerism, encouraging self-centred living. It sat on my kitchen bookshelf for almost two years. I half-hoped one of my guests might take it away. Increasingly its presence offended me. I read other books, and the more I learned from them the more this attractive volume weighed negatively in my home.

It is no more. Today I tore pages from it. I cut them into small sections to give away to friends. I have kept a few quotations for myself. Then, without any qualms, I gave it a ceremonial burial in my kitchen rubbish bin, covering it with the peel of about thirty mandarines. That wasn't enough. I took the plastic bag and deposited it in the local rubbish tip.

Tomorrow it will be gone. I feel good about that.
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