Things That Have Vanished From the World #2: Books Flush to the Edge of Book Shelves

Once upon a time, there was a certain way to keep books upon a shelf: All of the spines were lined up carefully so that they sat flush along the front edge of the shelf in a nice neat line. Each spine of each book flowed smoothly into the next, making a flat wall of books. Each title of each book was easily readable as your eyes scanned along them. It looked, and it was, orderly.

Today, however, visit a Barnes and Noble brick and mortar bookstore and you'll find the books shoved to the back of the shelf, the page side lined up, and the spines ragged and leering out at you like angry teeth desperately in need of braces.

There were reasons for lining the books up. It looks nice to begin with. It makes the titles easy to read. And it makes it easy to get the books off the shelf to read them without breaking the spines of clothbound books.

Now there are reasons for not lining the books up. Laziness. Bad examples. Bad training. Ignorance. And the idea that it's easier and faster to do that. Oh, that's just another name for laziness, isn't it.

I once asked a young lady why she was pushing all the books to the back of shelf. She said it was faster. I said it wasn't. She looked skeptical. I stepped over and pulled an entire shelf of books to the front edge of the shelf and evened them off with the palm of my hand in just a few seconds. She looked astounded. Bad examples. Bad training.

No one cares anymore.