Buying Books

Nowhere near this well-organized or light.

Last night (or rather in the early hours of this morning) my brother John drove me to a second-hand bookstore in a small nearby town. Only when you drove up close enough could you see the small, hand-lettered signs announcing the name and hours. It was cavernous and nearly windowless; it looked like it had once been a barn or a large garage at one time. The floor was rough and uneven, stones and gravel that had been worn smooth by years of use. But there were rows of bulging mismatched shelves against the walls and ancient tables groaning with books laid in rows, spine up.

And what a motley lot of offerings they were. I identified lots of texts that were obviously assigned for old college courses, once-classic books reduced to paperback form, things no one read anymore. There were faded fantasy books from decades old trends and fashions; I identified a particularly ‘groovy’ copy of The Last Unicorn that offended every aesthetic twinge in my body; but, you know, a variant, one I’d never seen before. Children’s books whose target audience had long since died or were sitting mumbling in old folk homes. Rows and piles of all kinds of niche volumes, the detritus of the reading of generations. For me, a perfect hunting ground.

Nobody else was there; not even, at the moment, the proprietor, a rather dim but bustling elderly man (even more elderly than me) who yelled politely at us in greeting and who sounded like he was busy in another part of his house, which somehow linked up to the store. John and I started browsing, none too enthusiastically, but with hope springing eternally in our hearts.

After what seemed about half-an-hour I had selected a load of six or seven dusty old friable paperbacks, vaguely interesting but nothing to set the world on fire. But at the store’s desperately low, low prices worth the gamble. John had found nothing and was looking a little frustrated. And more and more people were starting to crowd the store, which had drawn the proprietor out to mingle and shmooze. The day was starting to warm up. I glanced up into the rafters; there was a bale of books hanging, spines down, overhead. We decided it was time to leave. “We had seen everything Snake’s Bend had to offer.”

Perhaps needless to say this was all a dream, not unlike several I have with some regularity. It was no doubt brought on by the fact that I have a little birthday money burning in my pockets and I’ve been wanting to get to the library bookstore for almost a week. I suppose this is a quest I’ll have to attempt this morning. The dream commands. A journey of only a few blocks, but with my right knee like it is and as warm as the end of July is getting, no small undertaking. I’m afraid it will also take up any ‘juice’ I might have applied to Tolkien Tuesday this morning. But depending on how I feel … “Yet we may, Mr. Frodo. We may.”