New compulsion. Don't be alarmed, there's one of these every few days.

Allow me to interrupt this tale of romance, desperation, and desire, to bring you a little bit of nonsense and some blather about myself, blah blah blah.

I think I know what I will start buying the moment I find out I am pregnant.

Besides lots of fast food.

Not baby clothes, organic crib sheets, or oversized rosaries to hang over the crib.

NO. INSTEAD, I think I am going to go crazy buying books!

A week ago I went with a friend to a semi-annual mom-to-mom exchange. There, I learned two things:

1.) Woe to she that dares to tread where thrifty parents shop for deals!

and

2.) Even if you're entirely positive you will be a mom someday, you might want to wait until then to go to one of these sales. Just saying - there's nothing like looking through baby clothes for a non-existent child that makes you want to go on home and devour a giant bowl of cheese grits in silence.

But seriously, it was good that I went. It was nice to get out of the house, and I was able to help my friend, who was hauling around a stroller, a wagon, and a little baby - who was perfectly well-behaved, but still. That's a lot of stuff.

The only reason I was going to the sale was to buy some children's books as gifts, if I could find ones in good shape. (Now I wish I would have bought them in any condition.) Anyway, I enjoyed looking through the boxes of books and finding some old favorites that my mom read to us as kids. I didn't buy many, though, and when I got home and sat down and actually read the books I'd brought home, I fell in love with them. I reread Where the Wild Things Are, and The Relatives Came, and I read a few new ones I hadn't ever seen.

I didn't want to give them away! I wanted to keep them for myself for my future kids, for when we all pile on our bed and a couple kids sit on top of my back and one sits on each side and a couple little ones sit on top of them, too. I firmly believe that the reason I loved reading (and still do!) was because my mom read books to us every night. She didn't just read the words - she pointed to the pictures and made the characters talk and showed us the noises that the animals made and added sound effects for the weather in each picture.

I loved being read to, long after I could read on my own. I hope my kids do, too.

I'm keeping these books, I told my nicer, gift-giving self. Suck on that.

So I stashed my new-used books in The Empty Room/The Future Nursery... but then something happened. Immediately, the small size of the pile made me a little bit itchy.

Seven books is not nearly enough.

And that's when I started looking online, at Amazon and Half.com and BestWebBuys, for all the old books I used to love looking at. And then yesterday, I bought five! And then today... well, I had five in my shopping cart, but since they're out of print they're a little pricier. So - I just bought three.

(People and Noah's Ark and The Little Riders and Christmas and The Fox Went Out on a Chilly Night and We the People and The Star-Spangled Banner and Gobble Growl Grunt. I loved Peter Spier books then and I still do.)

But I swear I'm done now.

EXCEPT - next month (in about three weeks!) the Wake County Library System will be having their annual booksale! And baby, I'll be going!

I'll be looking for the books I used to love hearing, like Harold and the Purple Crayon, and Cloudy with a Chance of Meatballs, and The Snowy Day, and Chicken Soup with Rice. And more.

And whenever our family grows, so will the stack in The Empty Room. Except hopefully, it won't be so empty then.