This is  the room that attracted me when we bought our house 30 years ago. Mostly I Zoom to classrooms and meetings from here and I’m often asked whether my shelves are real or a faux background. There’s a stupid pail in the foreground that I must put away, so you know this is real.

Recenty I flipped through a home design magazine and admired some built in shelves which seemed to lack something. They had the odd empty vase but otherwise they were so bland and blank. What was missing? Books!

“Find the things you want to keep,” says Marie Kondo. “identify the things that make you happy.” Am I going to read any of these books again? There’s that possibility and I love the possibilities in life. Mostly they give me a sense of peace.