Books

Colby had thousands of books and many of them he had listed for sale online. The books were spread out over five rooms and other than his personal collection (which numbered about five hundred) none of the books were organized. Lack of organizational skills was part of Colby's dysgraphia disability, along with writing, knot tying, and math calculation. It takes me more than six months but I have examined each book, categorized it, evaluated it for online sales listing, and then either kept it or given it away.

Several hundred books went to Grandpa's House a Nashville-based program for men with mental illness and addiction. About a hundred were so damaged they went in the trash. Several I kept, and I carted more than forty boxes of books to the Goodwill. I still have about two hundred books from Colby's personal collection that I will keep for a while . . . or longer.

The reason this is important is that I carried the last box of books to the Goodwill today. This sorting through thousands of books has taken a good portion of my time. Plus, it was important to move them out so I can begin evaluating, organizing, sorting, categorizing and moving other groups of items such as his hundred or so DVDs, VHS tapes, and video games. There are also several hundred CDs and CD cases in various bags and boxes, and stacked loosely on shelves. Of course none of the CDs are actually in the cases or any where near the case they belong to. I will begin matching those up next. That could take me another six months. At least CDs are smaller than books.

The work is tiring, boring, mind-numbing. But in doing it I feel close to Colby. These were his things, things that were important to him, that meant something to him. The best I can do is keep the ones we were both connected to and find homes for the rest. They do no one any good sitting in a box or on a shelf. Colby would want this music that he loved so much to be appreciated by others. And it will be . . . many months from now.