A book’s broken spine can be damage to a collector and evidence of companionship to its owner.

A broken spine means damage to one person and companionship to another. The collector sees a reduction in value; the owner sees the record of a book that was carried, read in bed, taken on trains, and returned to. The same physical fact supports two completely opposite readings.

Decide which relationship you want with your own things. There is a real pleasure in keeping something pristine, and a different and greater one in using something until it shows it. Neither is wrong, and it is worth choosing rather than defaulting, particularly with objects that will only ever matter to you.