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Newsletter 1

I Rearranged My Books By Color and Died a Little Inside

It looked good on paper, you know the rest. Organizing my books by color was a beautifully bad idea.

Anna Cramer

Staff Writer

Born in Alaska and raised in Missouri, Anna made her way back to The Last Frontier 9 years ago with her amazing husband and cats in tow. She earned her Bachelor’s degree in Anthropology with an emphasis in Native American Studies from Missouri State University. Her favorites: family, cats, reading & writing, K-pop, hip hop, photography, wandering around the woods, red wine, and Saturday mornings.

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A “BRILLIANT” IDEA:

As with many modern day horror stories, this one begins with someone (me) seeing something online and thinking that they (I) can replicate it. It may have been Pinterest, could have been Instagram, but it was tagged with something along the lines of #BookshelfPorn. It was an image of a personal library that’d make most anyone weak in the knees. The particular reader had arranged their entire collection of books by color. A veritable rainbow of literature that drew one’s eyes fluidly across its magnificence. This aesthetically appealing arrangement was inducing  that new box of crayons kind of appreciation. I was doing this. Genre and Dewey be damned.

As was the case in childhood, I didn’t think about the potential consequences of my actions.

THE PROCESS:

Here’s how it went down—literally and figuratively. It was actually a lot of fun pulling my books and grouping them by color on my bed, spilling them over and across the floor. Admiring my collection and thumbing through the pages. I came across books that I’d forgotten I had and made mental notes to reread this or that. Then came the real problem: actually re-shelving. Reckless abandonment of everything I’ve ever known—chaotic, senseless and disorderly nonsense! I shelved historical fiction next to non-fiction. My God, I separated sequels and series to obey this asinine color schematic. Sheer insanity.

REALIZATION:

I stepped back to admire the ridiculousness of it all, the satisfaction was barely lived. I did what anyone else would do: snapped a picture, then promptly put everything back to the way it was before. As nice as that Penguin Orange section looked against the Phosphorescent Webster Dictionary Green section, I couldn’t stand the thought or sight of my genres and authors being so carelessly scattered. Lesson learned.