Did you ever have a childhood dream come true for you when you were a (very much over the hill) adult? Something like this happened to me about 5 years ago.
Growing up in the 1950s it was always my dream to have a personal copy of the Encyclopaedia Britannica. I wanted the 14th Revised Edition - the last great 24 volume single format indexed set. My parents could never have afforded it back then so I made do with lesser references at home or went to the library. The big set never happened for me.
We didn't buy one for my daughter either. By that time most of what she needed was online or on a bunch of CDs.
Then my daughter and son in law bought a home in Ottawa from an 85 year old lady who had occupied the house for 40+ years. When she was moving she had little shelf space in her seniors condo so she left behind - you guessed it - EB 14th Revised 1955 edition (with yearbooks up to about 1967.)
My daughter didn't want to throw the books away so I packed them up lovingly and brought them here. 60 years later my dream came true.
I love to take these books down and read the occasional article. The ones on computers, air travel and biochemistry are pretty obsolete; the ones on ancient philosophers, the Civil War or medieval history are still relevant of course. But oh my, what a set of books.