How will I ever read all those books?

My home office has been half packed, half unpacked since we moved.  The disorderly chaos was disturbing.  Surprisingly, most of my books made it out of boxes pretty quickly.  The paperbacks went back into boxes during the controversery about what shelving was going where.  Recently, the controversy ended and the shelves were returned to my office, immediately filled with the books from three boxes.  I moved books around and arranged them and rearranged them.  I found myself doing this when I came home extremely upset about something that happened at the end of the workday.  I realize that books calm me.  I love being surrounded by them.  I think, in the logical part of my mind, that I should not have so many books, that I buy more than I can read, that I'm not going to reread many of them so they could go to someone else.  But I love to see them, like little bound opportunities.  Adventures.  Knowledge.  Inspiration.  Possibilities.

So I continue to collect books.  And read books.  And borrow books, which I (almost) always return.  And still, I always want another.  The sad, beautiful fact (is) that we're all going to miss almost everything.  There is too much available for us to read it all, to see it all, to consume it all.  I'm horrible at culling--I like to try some of everything.  So I guess I must surrender!  I read books, listen to audiobooks, read blogs, love Facebook, watch way too much TV and would watch even more if I could figure out how...  I would love to be well-read, but agree with many that I would rather read well.

I think I may start my own "reading list" as I know that some of my favorites do not appear on others.  I have lent and replaced "Watership Down" so many times I lost count.  My grandma sent me a copy of Little Women, Little Men, and Black Beauty; I read and reread those beautiful volumes, which I still have and cherish.  I have lent my copy of Lucky Man by Michael J. Fox to several readers who loved it and lent it, and still gave it back to me.  I read, then bought and reread, then lost in a move and repurchased, the Chronicles of Narnia.  I recently picked up two of the series by Marguerite Henry, who I read in elementary school when I read everything our library had about horses before reading "The Yearling" in three weeks.  I think I was in fourth grade; the librarian warned me that I would have to check it out twice because of the length--no one else understood why I would want to spend my Christmas break with this huge novel.  I have a ton of books I want to read but haven't started (or finished!) yet.  Mosley, Koontz, Cather, Thoreau, so many more are all waiting for me.  So I will keep dipping my cup in the very large ocean.