There is nothing more beautiful than entering a Barnes and Noble and smelling that aroma of stories and coffee. I thrive off it like it's a drug. Nor is there anything like finally buying a long-awaited book and taking it home, laying in your cozy bed, cracking open the spine, and flipping to the first page. The way that we all read a string of letters that make words and sentences and form a whole new world in 345 pages is just magical to me.

I recently had to buy new bookshelves simply because my old bookshelf just wasn't cutting it anymore. I had books covering the ground, stacked on top of each other, and in boxes. So I guess you could say I am a bit of a book nerd.

Within the book community, there tends to be a huge "no-no" when it comes to books. It's frowned down upon and a huge deal is made when they see someone who does it. What is it? Dog-earing pages.

Now, I love my books as much as the next person. In fact, when buying them I always like to pick the best quality one out there. I mean if I'm paying $15 for a book, it better look nice right? However, I have always been someone who dog-ears their pages.

I know.

But I actually hate bookmarks. They fall out, and I have to figure out where to put them when I read and it's just a huge mess. Dog-earing pages is the easiest way. And I wasn't always this way. I used to be a huge OCD mess when it came to my books. But lately, I have seen something beautiful when it comes to worn out and read-through pages.

They always say, the best books are the ones with the tattered covers and ripped pages because it means that many people have read them and loved them. And since I had heard that, I have gained a love for "using" my books more, and breaking them in. A book doesn't have to stay perfect forever. In fact, it's more beautiful when it is tattered and dog-eared to death.

I started out dog-earing pages just for convenience sake but now I realize that getting books messy and used-in is okay. In fact, it's the point of a book. To read it over and over to the point of no return.

So don't freak out as you spill coffee all over your book because you were laughing too hard at a passage, or panic when your friend returns a book with a few too many bent pages. It means it was well-loved and used. What else could a book want?

So look at your bookshelf of clean, crisp books. See how perfect and pretty they are? Don't be afraid to mess them up a little. Bend some pages, throw it across the room when you get angry at a character, and let the tears fall on the page when someone dies. Fall asleep reading and wake up on top of the book with half of it bent and the pages crinkled.

Because it's all part of the reading experience.

You wouldn't tell someone to go to Disneyland and expect them to not touch anything right? So why do you read your book like it's a piece of China in a china shop?

Just read, and enjoy doing it. That's all books want us to do.