July 28, 2008

Will Books Soon be Obsolete?


I love books. Last night, in spite of the fact that I had about a billion other things to do, I curled up with a book and indulged myself by escaping into someone else's story. What fun!

It got me thinking about the new eco-minded trend toward digital reading. Have you heard of Kindle? Roughly the size of a paperback, and weighing less than one pound, this device holds the content of approximately 200 books. Where was this thing when I was dragging around a backpack throughout my entire education? It would have been a whole lot easier balancing this while riding a bike.

To use Kindle, you simply shop, choose and download your books, and no trees have to be chopped down, no ink has to be printed, no gas has to be spent on delivery or pick-up. I highly recommend this device for those who have no preference about how they get their reading done. It is brilliant.

But I am a romantic. I like standing in the rain, drinking coffee alone in a cafe, watching people reunite in airport terminals, and caressing the pages of a book in which I am entrenched.

Books are also decor in our home. It's actually a dream of mine to one day own a home with an entire wall dedicated to bookshelves bearing books. And does anyone else feel oddly serene and comfortable beyond measure in bookstores and libraries? Is it just me? I can practically hear the whispers of all the legends, tales, romances, betrayals, truths and lies, adventures and childhood memoirs echoing off the racks and stacks. Being surrounded by books makes me feel at one with all humanity.

And what about bedtime stories with our children? Olivia already loves carrying her books to and fro, turning their pages, and delighting in the pictures. Click here and here for a couple green book options for children.

So I guess if asked what my dirty little non-green secret is, it would be that I plan to keep books in my life forever. No device, no matter how tiny or sassy, will ever replace or usurp my affinity for the real thing.

There are however, eco-friendly ways to feed your love of reading. I adore the character of used books... buy them instead of new ones whenever possible. Also, please visit my post on Eco-Libris, an organization which plants a tree for every book you read. They also sponsor a green minded book exchange you may learn about in the same post.

I'm off to go read!

4 comments:

latisha said...

i so wonder about this all the time. i love the romance in reading a smelly old paperback while i sip my tea. and reading digital is not the same. and what about the library?? books for free can't go away? i remember summers of bags and bags full of books.

Petite Planet said...

I know! I love the library- it is so indulgent to be able to grab so many books off the shelf and walk out with them for free!

intime0 said...

I agree, I agree. We can find used books on ebay, Amazon, garage sales, paperbackswap, and thrift stores. No need for more trees to die for older books...LOL

Lisa Nelsen-Woods said...

I love paper books too and I hope they don't completely go away. I'm living the dream because I finally have a wall of bookshelves in my house. For the first time in my life, I actually have more bookshelves than I do books!

As much as I love computers and IT, there are times when my back tells me that I need to step away from the computer because I'm doing too much on line reading.