Book Hunting
I recently moved and my new place is within walking distance to a used book store. I have a real love of used book stores and never pass a chance to visit one. I’m a natural hoarder anyway, but I’m a real bibliophile on top of that. All that said, I found that my searching for old books reminds me a lot of my approach to hunting. I search in likely places and hope to get lucky. I could easily order the book online and have it delivered to me… that would be like getting meat from the grocery store, feels like cheating. Also, like hunting, I find myself interested in acquiring unique and rare books and shopping for them in new locations. One of my fondest memories is wandering around Victoria and happening on three different book stores. After a weekend trip, I flew home with nine books. Another parallel is that I like to look at other people’s book collections like I would their taxidermy or hunting photos. On that same Victoria trip, I treated myself to a visit to the Hand of Man Museum full of all sorts of taxidermy, antiques, and most exciting to me… books. The one that stood out to me was a signed first edition of Sir Edmund Hillary’s account of Everest (he was the first to reach the summit).
My new apartment needs some furnishing, and I could easily go online a buy whatever I need, but I refuse to. I enjoy the thrill of the hunt at the local shops for just the right item. As a result, everything I have bought for it is almost exactly the item I want and has a bit more weight to it, it feels like it was put there with a little more purpose.
I think, in general, everyone has their own versions of hunting. Thousands of years have pounded that instinct into us and even if you hate the idea of killing an animal… you may still love hunting for deals at a garage sale. Then again, that may just be a gatherer thing instead.
Anyway, enough about books, I’ve gotta hit the road and do some goose hunting.
Posted in Huntingwith no comments yet.
Leave a Reply