Today, motivation struck in a great burst of WA-PA! and I began to sort books, papers, etc. to take with me to Killeen for internship. I’ve been putting this off…not sure why. We can spend time analyzing that a la Freud some other time.
Anyway, back to the motivation…
I launched first into gathering the books I think I will need for my office at the church. I found myself wondering what my collection of books says about me and what others might think based on the titles. If I take my book about infant baptism, am I going to get lots of questions about that? Will my bookcases look like Luther himself threw up all over them? I found myself at first judging books based on not their usefulness but on these impressions.
Somewhere along the way I realized how idiotic I was being. I had limited myself, for instance, to NO books about liturgy – when I have traveled faithfully through the last ten or so years with Frank Senn’s Christian Liturgy by my side. (If you aren’t familiar with it, it’s three inches thick and all about – you guessed it – Christian liturgy.) My rationalization began with, “Why the heck would I need that???” and ended with me taking it off the shelf and packing it, just for the hell of it, because I like the comfort it gives me and the joy I have seeing it on my shelf (and reading in it, every so often). And, just for ha-has, I added three other books about liturgy, too.
So there!
Sometimes, we just need what is comfortable around us. I found an old quilt and I am taking that. I will take the cherub pen holder my mom gave me, plus a couple of needlework pieces which she had in her office. Every so often, I’ll get to take our dog and the apartment will look more like a home with his puppy toys strewn about the floor.
Preparing for this type of home-but-not-home seems less daunting when I know I’ll have a bit of the familiar with me.
Onward!
