Book Loss

This morning I reached for my mama's Spinnerin Fisherman Afghan knitting magazine.

It was gone.

It's gone forever. I knew that with the certainty that comes with having a messy room and a messy head and a messy life -- sometimes things are buried or fall down the cracks, and sometimes, they're just gone. And you know, you know within a very short period of time, which one is true.

I haven't had a panic attack since spring, and I certainly didn't expect it to be the loss of a book that would trigger the next one. Luckily I saw it coming, stopped the frantic searching, took off my sweater, drank a glass of water, and hopped on the computer.

It was so weird, feeling that anxiety come on, and intellectually knowing that it was over a book, a book that I wasn't even going to use in the next 5 hours, but having to get on eBay right away in order to buy a replacement copy that very second. I staved off the complete emotional breakdown, ate an English muffin, and went off to a baby shower. Still thinking about that book. It won't be delivered until later this week, next week at the latest

(please don't let it be next week, I can't handle waiting that long)

I'm grateful for eBay.

Spinnerin is a magazine from the 70's, and I had despaired for a long time of finding more magazines. It's a goddamn miracle that I remembered the magazine title, and was able to find the exact copy I needed within literally less than 1 minute of internet searching.

I learned how to knit, how to really knit, from this magazine. I have a blanket my mama made from one of the patterns, I've completed three afghans to date, and have 4 more in various stages.

It's gone, I don't know where it went, my gut tells me it got thrown away (it looks tatty and something like the advertisement magazines you get in the Sunday paper). If I find it, I'll laugh, but I know I won't find it. Whenever I need to lay my hands on something, I can do it. I can find anything. When I can't find a thing, when my hands are touching air, then I know. I know it's gone.

I know when it's gone.

I'm looking at my bookshelf now, wondering if any of them were to disappear, would I freak out?

Hmmm it appears I am missing a few things, I can see... one of my British duplicates (worth having if changes were made to the American version). I think I know where it is though. The John Allison books are out of print and ridiculously expensive to buy these days, so I would be annoyed if I lost my copies, but probably not upset.

Oh, I bought another copy of Emma because it was bound upside-down and had great design.

The shelf with all the children's books, I think, would maybe panic me a little bit. Children's books are weirdly difficult to find, especially picture books, because your brain is going to remember the illustrations, and not necessarily the story. I have a small catalogue in my brain of things I saw once, or things I read over and over as a child, but haven't been able to find again because it's a visual memory and you can't reverse image-search your brain.

(wouldn't that be neat though, if you could?)

One of them is Piggins by Jane Yolen, which is about a Victorian household of Foxes, with Piggins in the pig butler, and he solves a crime over dinner. It had these gorgeous illustrations of the Victorian house and all the domesticity, and of course, the jewels and fancy dress and it fascinated me as a child. It took me years and years to find that book again but it was completely worth it.

Are you missing anything from your childhood?

Do you guys remember the book about the two girls who were best friends, but one of them went to summer camp, and the one who was left behind had these weird fantasies about rescuing her friend from camp and bringing her home and giving her an IV of chocolate milk?