The Books That Refused to Die

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 Most of you who have spent any time around me know that I love thrift stores. In fact, my THT (more on that later) has a name for me. Sister Shops With a Fist.  I've found age-appropriate true leather pants, Tiffany-inspired lamps, and shirts that could only be labeled as "hot damn." 

When my weight was yo-yo-ing from a size 10 to a size 18 and back again, thrift stores saved my budget. Because face it, I'm a clothes horse. 

There's one other thing I'm worse about collecting, though. Books. Especially Earth Centered Religions, Paganism, Rootwork, Hoodoo, Conjure, New Age, Metaphysical volumes of all sorts. Mainly, I find them at yard sales, Facebook Marketplace, and Craigslist. But something happened yesterday that surprised even me. 

I was standing in a thrift store, a sister store to Savers back in the Midwest called Value Village, minding my business, when the shelves started talking.

Not whispering.
Not hinting.
Talking.

I left my perusal of yet another collection of rubber stamps, and there they were—stacked crooked, spines worn soft, pages dog-eared by hands that had actually used them: pagan books. Real ones. Not the pastel, moon-babe, manifestation-journal nonsense. I mean Enneagram psychology, spiral dance lineage, art-as-ritual, soul-work texts, and the kind of spiritual books that come with footnotes, arguments, and a mild disdain for performative enlightenment.

And I had a very clear, very Midwest thought:

These books would have been thrown straight in the dumpster back in Kansas City. 

Not donated.
Not shelved.
Not priced at $2.99 with a shrug.

Discarded. Quietly. Possibly with prayer.

Geography Shapes the Afterlife of Books

In the Midwest, pagan-adjacent books don’t age gracefully. They don’t get “re-homed.” They get weeded. I've seen them in dumptsters with all manner of foul liquids poured over them so they don't "infect" someone. 

Libraries purge them first. Then churches complain. Then someone decides they’re “confusing.” Then they vanish.

You don’t even get the courtesy of controversy. Just absence. Even with the big used book retailers' yearly sale of Gaylord's, full of books, the only way you'll find one is if someone was careless in their weeding. 

Out here?
They survive.

They land in thrift stores with yoga pants and chipped mugs, as if it’s perfectly reasonable that a book about spiritual transformation might sit between a crockpot and a copy of Chicken Soup for the Dog Lover’s Soul.

And honestly?
It is reasonable.

These Aren’t Beginner Books. They’re Survivors.

Let’s be clear: the books I found weren’t fluffy.

They were the kind of texts that:

  • Ask uncomfortable questions

  • Assume the reader can think

  • Don’t apologize for complexity

  • Expect you to wrestle with yourself instead of buying candles about it

These are the books people donate when they’re done pretending or too tired to keep digging.

Or worse—when someone else cleans out their house and decides “No one needs this.”

Which, Ma’am, is how entire spiritual lineages end up priced cheaper than a latte.

The Midwest Fear of Depth (Let’s Say It Out Loud)

Here’s the part folks don’t like to admit:

The Midwest has a long-standing discomfort with spirituality that doesn’t stay in its lane.

If it isn’t Christian.
If it isn’t neat.
If it doesn’t come with a moral bow and a clear hierarchy—

It gets labeled as dangerous, confusing, or pointless.

Especially if it empowers people to:

  • Know themselves

  • Question authority

  • Develop personal spiritual agency

That’s when the trash bag comes out.

Not dramatically. Just efficiently.

Thrift Stores as Accidental Archives

Out here, thrift stores have become unintentional sanctuaries.

They are holding:

  • The books people outgrew

  • The books families didn’t understand

  • The books that didn’t fit the approved narrative

And sometimes—if you’re paying attention—they hand you exactly the text you need now, not the one you would have chosen online.

No algorithm.
No influencer.
No aesthetic shelfie.

Just a battered paperback saying, “You ready yet?”

This Is How Pagan Knowledge Survives

Not through bestseller lists.
Not through TikTok trends.
Not through shiny new covers.

It survives because:

  • Someone didn’t burn it

  • Someone didn’t throw it away

  • Someone put it on a shelf instead

And because someone else—you, me, us—recognized it for what it was and took it home.

That’s lineage.
That’s continuity.
That’s resistance with a price tag under five bucks.

Final Thought (Because I’m Not Done)

If you ever wonder where the real pagan books went—the ones with teeth, history, and backbone—

Check the thrift stores. Especially in places where difference isn’t immediately punished.

And if you find one?

Don’t feel lucky.

Feel responsible.

Because that’s not just a book.

That’s a survivor.

And apparently, so are you.

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