I will never be able to read all the books

This is unlike my usual content - more of a musing, the shared pain of readers perhaps.

I sit here across from my bookshelf, filled with such a mixture of feelings. I love looking at my bookshelf; I'm not only a reader but a collector and a lover of books. I can spend hours in a bookshop and looking at my bookshelf is much the same - 115 unread books, endless possibilities. It fills me with joy and excitement to think of all the ones I haven't read yet - characters I haven't discovered, adventures I haven't been on. If anything the choice is sometimes overwhelming: I want to read everything, all the time, which is unfortunately not possible. I'm loving my current read (The Gilded Wolves) but find myself anxious to plan what I'm going to pick next: should it be autumn themed? A cosy fantasy perhaps? Or a murder mystery to perfectly set against the upcoming rainy days?

And this is where the sadness kicks in because I will never be able to read them all. All the ones on my shelf, perhaps, if I am careful with my spending habits, but I also have an ever-growing Waterstones wishlist and screenshots in my camera roll, which only grow in number with each new visit to a bookstore or bookstagram recommendation. Time is finite, and the number of books published every week is vast. And yet I am consumed with this feeling, this obsession to read more, like I could ever catch up. I want to quit my job (I love my job), I want to lock myself in my house (I would miss my friends too much), I want an eternal autumn of cosy blankets and hot chocolates with nothing to do except read (seasonal affective disorder not included).

Nothing will come of this, but it feels relieving to put my thoughts on (digital) paper and hope that someone else feels this way too. For now I'll go back to planning the perfect fall tbr, racing through my current book so I can start the next one, and dreaming of my black friday haul when I'll add even more books to my collection.