Crafts, Books, and My Imagination Running Away With Me

Recently, I've been on this crafting kick and I've been reading/following on Tumblr a lot of crafty blogs and crafty-type people for inspiration. I don't know why I do this to myself because we all know how I am about finishing projects that I start. But, anyway, I came across this video that explains how to make a cool invisible shelf that makes it looks like your books are floating on the wall, like so:

Pretty cool, right? So I decided I desperately needed these shelves, because not only do they look pretty sweet, but it would help me get all the piles of books that I have laying on the ground off the floor. Since the video made it look pretty easy, I figured, what the hey. Now because I did not have any big heavy books that I was willing to sacrifice, I decided to go to Half Price Books (oh how I love thee) to find some in the clearance section or there abouts that looked pretty cool that I would not care about cutting into.

Then I came across these lovely beauties:

Awesome right? Perfect for looking nice on the wall since the spine is really all I care about. Well, if you've never heard of Half Price Books, it's a used bookstore that buys and sells (at half price) used books. It is a real treasure trove and I love going there because 1. it's cheap and 2. it's got books and 3. I always find some pretty cool/unique stuff. I love going there just to see what I can find when I have no particular book I'm looking for, like for this project, for example.

Anyway, as I started looking through these red books to see how much they were ($6) and which ones I wanted (I couldn't buy all of them at $6 each!), I noticed that many of them had an inscription on the inside cover (another thing I love about looking through used books). Then I noticed it was all the same inscription over the period of 3 years and for various holidays:

They are all for "Mom" from "Neal" and sometimes from "Neal and Sally." It dates back from the mom's birthday in 1969 to Valentine's Day of 1971. Out of the 12 books in the collection available at Half Price books, only 4 of them did not have an inscription. Despite the lack of an inscription on 4 of them, I feel it's safe to assume that it was an entire set once owned by "Mom" and given to her from "Neal" (and a few from "Sally"). But, here's where my imagination ran away with me.

As I started thinking more and more about the inscription and why this whole set would be at Half Price Books, it made me kind of sad. I'm guessing Neal was the son (I know pretty crazy guess, huh?), and this woman either loved book collections, Newsweek, art, or art museums. In the hopes to get a great gift that he could spread out in several gifts (I'm sure they were expensive, since I just saw that the set is going for $135 on eBay.), Neal decided to get his mom this set of books to show his mom all of these great places and the art contained inside them since most likely she would not be able to go to these far off exotic art museums.

I'm also guessing that Sally was a sister. My mom thought that perhaps she was Neal's wife or girlfriend, but because Sally only shows up in two inscriptions: that for Christmas 1969 and June 14, 1970, I think I'll stick with my sister assumption. I'm curious, however, about the June 14, 1970 inscription, since it's the only specific date in the set. Is that "Mom's" birthday? An anniversary of marriage? Death? Why is this date so significant? The details are too few that I can't venture a guess on this one.

And finally, why did this entire beautiful collection wind up at the Half Price Books in McKinney, TX. Sadly, I think that "Mom" is no longer with us, and as "Neal" was forced to go through all of the things that once belonged to his mother, he couldn't bare to keep this book collection. Maybe they were too heavy, a waste of space, he felt he'd never have a use for them, or maybe they reminded him too much of his mother and all of the occasions and memories he had of her receiving each book and her reaction as she opened the present. Knowing he and the books might be better off in a new home, he sold them, along with others, I'm sure, to Half Price books.

Where a few have just become my new bookshelves...