Archive for July 12th, 2008
Ode to the Bookshop
Since I won’t be getting to the Pyramids of Egypt anytime soon, I thought I’d pay tribute to a more local manmade wonder that excites the imagination in equal measure – the good old-fashioned, home-grown, used bookshop. Yes Books in Portland, Maine is a favorite. Situated at a busy corner of upper Congress Street, between a neighborhood sandwich shop and Paul’s Food Center, and standing directly across from a Starbucks, its very location speaks of its precarious place in the American story.
Ah, Yes!
This time of year its door is propped open, most likely to catch a breeze . . . but I wonder, is there a purer symbol of democracy than this? Inside is calm and hushed. The stacks are disheveled. The lightning is bad. The aisles are narrow and cramped. A small shop, I can easily feel lost inside. Its homey disarray makes me want to plant myself on the floor and start reading from the nearest pile. Yes Books is my piece of heaven. The perfect respite from ordinary life.
Where to begin?
This is my grandparent’s attic, my mother’s hope chest, the abandoned house we raided as kids. A place suspended in time. A place of ghosts, filling my head with voices other than my own. I want to stay here all day, scaling the shelves for that overlooked gem that will change my life forever. I want fall asleep here, wake up the next morning and start all over again.
What’s this?
I never knew North America had its own arithmetic!
My math skills might’ve flourished if I’d had this book in school.
I fall in love a hundred times in the bookstore.
What is it like to be a bird?
But I’ve learned not to grow too attached to every book I meet. Some are meant simply to be admired. Only a few get to travel home with me.
Think I’ll pass on this one.
This has possibilities.
Since 1987 the National Trust of Historic Places has been listing its eleven most endangered places in America each year. The Lower East Side, Cannery Row, Mesa Verde, even Route 66 Motels are listed. I vote to put the independent used bookshop on that list. And while I’m at it, to those noble independent bookstore owners everywhere, keeper of treasures, defenders of intellectual diversity, openers of doors – thank you from the bottom of my heart.
