What to Do With All Those Books?

I've always enjoyed reading. I'm thankful to my sister for introducing me to books and teaching me to read at a young age. I can remember many a summer day when we would get on our bikes and ride across town to the library. I loved the smell of the library and the quietness. I loved browsing through the books and picking out the jewels that would go home with me. I still like going to the library, but find myself more and more in book stores. I don't know why but there is something special about buying a book. One thing I like is knowing it belongs to me and I don't have a deadline to return it. The problem in that process though is that most books I buy, I don't want to keep. I've passed books on to friends, donated to the library and various booksales, and donated to charities. But I still have books.

Recently a friend of mine sent me a link to Bookcrossing. This is a site for books that mirrors Where's George? Bookcrossing lets you register your books and then the idea is to pass them on either randomly or controlled. The random realease involves putting a note on the book telling people that it is a free book and then a label is on the book explaining the website and also displaying the Bookcrossing ID number. In a perfect world, you could leave a book at CC's Coffee House in Baton Rouge and watch it as it travels the world. Reality is the majority of people will take the book, read it, pass it on, keep it, throw it away, etc. and never log on and journal where it is. So while I really would like to follow at least one of "my" books, if that doesn't happen I'm at least clearing out some closets and hopefully making some stranger happy.