We do NOT Burn Books

My mother-in-law has recently been decluttering her house. Being German she is a great stickler for keeping paperwork. Some of this is fair enough but there comes a point where there is no point in keeping 20+ years’ worth of fuel and telephone bills. Being security minded, she didn’t just want to throw the excess paperwork straight into the recycling bin. To properly dispose of this paperwork she borrowed our paper shredder which did an admirable job of obfuscating personal data until a combination of the recycling bin being full to overflowing and the shedder having a nervous breakdown put a halt to the process.

Her alternative disposal method was to ask me to burn the old paperwork. This, in part, was because it was far cheaper than buying a new shredder and also because she thinks I am some sort of wanton pyromaniac. I think this is rather unfair although I was able to spend an evening merrily throwing old phone bills into a flaming metal bucket whilst cackling uncontrollably and listening to Rammstein records at full blast.

The other thing which she has been clearing out is her enormous collection of books. She is very much one of those people who never throws a book out although some of them have not been touched for years: old novels, out of date reference books and even the set of “English for Foreign Students” books that she bought in London in the 1950’s after fleeing East Germany. Some of these books have found a willing home in our local library who find it hard to justify their meagre budget on foreign language books but many are just too difficult to find a willing home.

Raymond suggested that one solution would be to have another bonfire for the old books but he was told, very firmly, that “We do NOT burn books in this family.” Aside from missing a rather important piece of European history I also think he is missing a trick. I looked up the most unlikely of titles on eBay, the “Learn English” books from 1959 and there is a surprising market for them. I suspect that some of the other titles would be lucky to cover their postage costs but it does seem like a reasonable method of finding good homes for the items. Aside from anything else, I’m sure there are cheaper sources of firewood.