What value does an old out-dated text book have? Nothing, money wise, but I can remember what a thrill it was to us as children to find an old school book a parent had owned and read notations made. In one my daddy had, he had written these almost exact words-- " Here I am in the middle of June in school when I want to be outside working and enjoying the summer." He only went to school in the winter and for a short time in the summer when crops were laid by.
Several boxes of books and many years of National Geographic went to Goodwill Saturday. I feel bad about discarding 50 years of National Geographic because I used to find it so interesting. Few people want magazines now; they choose the Internet. At one time old Geographics were sold in book stores in New Orleans.
My freshman English book was among those discarded. I took a look at it and couldn't believe I learned a lot of that stuff. LSU divided freshmen into X, Y and Z classes. I was in X which gave a year's credit for one semester's work. That was fine except we had to write twice as many themes, or essays. I had trouble thinking of subjects. Today, that would be no trouble because I want to comment ( raise hell) about so many things. My class began at 1 p.m. and the room was empty from 12 to 1. I would show up at noon, take my fountain pen and write a paper, then hand it in without any corrections or changes. I agree, it was a miracle I passed the course.
My freshman history book was in a box to be discarded, but I saved it and will keep it at least for a little while.
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