To Those with Unfinished Books

I sit on the edge of my bed in my New York apartment staring at my bookshelf. It’s a tall bookshelf, and one that, with help, was carried up our sixth floor walk up. It’s in a bit of disarray. Once alphabetically organized books now pile and lean without order.

I see lots of bookmarks. Some come from the Strand, some are torn receipts, bits of scrap paper. They are a motley crew, the books and the bookmarks, worn from being carried around in backpacks and sweaty hands through the city.

As I sit in front them, they all ominously whisper to me a difficult and all too human truth: you’re not finished.

We’ve been left unfinished.

I’ve got a copy of Jonathan Safron Foer’s Extremely Loud and Incredibly Close sitting in front of me with 15 pages left, a copy of Giovanni’s Room with 20 pages left, a copy of Homegoing that’s been just under halfway completed for at least 3 years. There are a few hundred pages of Donna Tartt’s Goldfinch done with a few hundred left to go, a biography of Marlon Brando in similar shape. There’s a stack of the six books I’ve purchased since the start of 2020, not one of them finished, most of them unopened since my splurge at the Strand (well, one of my splurges at the Strand, that is).

While I sit before the hundreds of adventures, explorations, and gems of wisdom these books hold, the first thing on my mind aren’t the stories to be found on a bookshelf. I don’t see the stories of James Baldwin or Toni Morrison or Donna Tartt. Instead, I see the stories of who I have believed myself to be- stories often left uncontested and unchallenged by curiosity or courage.

Unfinished books have been such a root of shame for me. Perhaps you understand, sweet human stumbling upon these words. Unfinished, incomplete, without follow through- these words surrounding books have become identifying words for me.

Take this blog post, for example. This post was left unfinished for a few weeks, and when I saw it over and over on the top of my to do list, I didn’t see the possibility in creative writing, I saw shame- calling itself by my name- telling me I was one who did not complete.

You are unproductive, it will say.
You aren’t educated enough, you are doomed to fail.
It’s not like you’ve ever finished before, so why would you finish now?
You are one who abandons.
You are one who runs.

And when I witness these stories, these voices telling me who I am with such certainty, how could I ever find the excitement and wonder waiting in an excellent book?

These stories and voices lead me to a boy walking out of the library ambitiously checking out a dozen books and failing to get through a page or two of them. This boy goes back over and over to that library combatting “I’m not smart enough” with “I will read everything,” “I am never going to be as good a student/good a reader/good a writer/good a _______ as ______,” with “I will be the best and do the most I possibly can.” This boy grows up, putting expectations on himself to finish 5 AP classes per year, compete and complete top programs, be the best in top positions, only to fail over and over, never really losing the shame.

A book is a wonderful gift, like any piece of art, that can give us intimate familiarity to spaces far away, to people far away, physically or otherwise. A book reminds us that we aren’t alone. How heartbreaking, then, to feel such shame and loneliness, staring at a bookshelf. How heartbreaking it is that such a young one felt he needed to complete a dozen books, rather than experience the joy and wisdom of one page at a time.

Over time, I’ve learned to finish more books. To be honest, I added an English minor to my college degree, in part, to learn to finish some books. (Let’s not talk about high school.) And yet, I stare at a bookshelf realizing all I’ve carried with me for so long. As many books as I’ve carried up the six flights of stairs to my apartment, I’ve carried stories of the shame of incompletion.

As I sit a little longer, breathe a little longer, the books staring back at me, still unfinished, another question arises.

What if I talked to the little boy inside who walked out of that library with a dozen books? What if I asked him what he wanted?

So, dear one, what do you want?

…

I want a book to play with, to imagine with. I want a book to explore, to ask new questions, to learn new ways to respond to people I know nothing about. I want a book to help me fall in love with people. I want a warm hug from a book I carry. If the book is meant to challenge me, I want the space to let my soul awaken while reading it. I want to love reading because I am allowed to love reading, not because I have another task to finish. I want to leave books unfinished and take a deep breath.

…

I see the little boy in the library walking out with the books in his hand. I go up and whisper into his ear. You only need one, pick the one you love the most today and let the rest go. If you don’t finish it, you don’t finish it. This book will be a safe and soft place to land because you don’t have to prove anything simply by finishing a book.

And the boy puts down the books, looks through them for the one that excites him the most, and walks out with just that one.

I stand up from the bed and walk forward to the bookshelf, picking up a book, one still unfinished. The voice of fear is lost to the joy of this inner child, relieved of the pressure to complete, to perfect, to make total sense of. I sit down and read, just for today, and the world opens.

There sits on my bookshelf a great number of unfinished books. There sits on my to do list a great number of unfinished tasks. There sits on my goal list a great deal of unfinished goals. There is great help in a plan, in steps, and in direction, and there is greater help in telling my inner child there is no shame in imperfection.

May a bookshelf be a safe place for unfinished stories, for playful children. May your version of a bookshelf be a safe place for all your stories yet to find ending, yet to find closure. Because ultimately, like the books on my shelf, we are ultimately all unfinished. Unfinished individuals, in unfinished situations, unfinished relationships, living in unfinished cities, an unfinished country. We will need more than a strive to finish a dozen books, we will need the deepest compassion from the richest well to find our way from risk to risk, from story to story, from heart to heart. We may never finish, in fact. We will journey through this world with enough before us, and a bookshelf filled with unfinished books will always be there to come home to when we need it.