Taking a break from all the boxes needing to be unpacked, came across Giving my books the kiss-off.
And thus began a process with which I have grown–as a man who has led a peripatetic life–heartbrokenly familiar. You take root someplace, then a call comes from Fortune herself and you move on to another place. And since there is no moving on without a leaving behind, you teach yourself to discard.
You cannot take everything with you–even the Scriptures say that, though in respect only of the Last Passage. So acquaintances, clothes, furniture, pictures, all must be culled; as, too, must books, whose loss can sometimes weigh most heavily of all. Some measure out their lives with coffee-spoons; I do so with books left behind (in such places as Delhi, Oxford, London and Madrid).
Meanwhile, boxes of culled books serve as seating.