Will we lose dear friends?

It's almost like hearing that someone you love has been diagnosed with a fatal disease.

"More than four million kindles were sold this holiday season ... e-book sales up 175 percent."

Such a sad prophecy. What will happen to our dear friend the book?

There is something about walking into a bookstore or library ... of feeling embraced by the shelves of books – a certain comfort, a stirring of excitement in the belly – oh, the adventures awaiting our fingertips.

A friend tells us books will never disappear, that they have been around for hundreds of years.

Huh.

So were pen and paper in some form and letter writing has all but disappeared to be replaced by electronic mail.

These days, it seems like everything is done electronically.

Even a normal phone conversation is beginning to become extinct. Everywhere you look, people are sending text messages. And half the time, what is sent to the other person does not even use language.

"LOL?"

But a text message cannot convey a tone or emotion.

And an email cannot be scented with a lover's perfume to make the heart beat faster.

And an e-book will not carry the scent of a book's pages or the comfort of its weight. There is something about the weight of a book that encourages a dash home and a curling up. No so with an e-book reader.

Will libraries and bookstores disappear eventually? Will everything soon be "checked out" over the Internet?

What a sad, sad thought.