Booksellers are the most spoiled people on earth. When they read books, those volumes are pristine. They have the opportunity to fall in love with a book long before it is released to the public at large--thanks to advance reading copies sent to them by publishers. And they are paid to talk about books.
They also have jobs that are physically demanding and aerobically beneficial--climbing stairs and ladders are integral parts of the job. And the only rich bookseller is a trust-fund endowed bookseller.
I've been away from the trade for almost a year, and there has rarely been a day that I haven't missed a small portion of it. As a "civilian," I have had one hell of a time finding anyone with whom I can have a satisfying book discussion--the rest of the world seems to reserve those comments for their book groups, using "I liked it" or "I hated it" for any other chat involving reading habits.
When you're a bookseller, you live in a world of why.
I've tried to be a recovering bookseller. I've judged a book prize, reviewed books that I love, have gone to the library for my reading material. Of all of those activities, only the prize judging gave me a hint of the camaraderie, insight, and humor that was my daily bookselling sustenance.
Reviewing books is a purely one-sided affair--if it's done online, at least the number of hits are shown, but who knows if the reader finished the review, disagreed with it, bought the book....these are things a bookseller longs to know.
As for libraries--if I read one more book that is adorned with another person's meal, I'll become a functional illiterate.
I'm lucky--the bookstore that exemplifies the best of bookselling is letting me return for the summer, on a part-time basis so I can both work there and write. It may not be paradise, but it's as close as I will ever get.
"Hello. I'm Janet, and I'm a bookseller."
Thursday, May 1, 2008
Saturday, March 29, 2008
Bookstore at the Edge of the World
When people describe this place, it is mandatory to talk about the "creaky wooden floors" but truthfully they only look as though they will creak--what they actually manage best is attempted homicide. During the decade-plus that I worked at the Elliott Bay Book Company, those floors almost killed me more than once, when the thin heels of my pseudo-Jimmy Choos became caught in the wide cracks between the planks of flooring and almost brought me to my knees. Charming, yes--hazardous, beyond any doubt.
Since it is a Seattle bookstore, I may be the only fool whose cigarette heels became a hostage of the floor--this is the land of sensible shoes where comfort trumps style in a big way and Birkenstocks excite no sneers. I am not however the only person who has come away from the rough-hewn bookshelves with one or two splinters. This may be one of the only bookstores on the planet where a pair of tweezers has a permanent and prominent spot near the cash drawer, and booksellers are routinely asked if they have a band-aid by customers who sport minor flesh wounds from slivers of cedar.
It is a spot that booklovers hope to find when they die, if they are good in this life. Along with the murderous floors and the splinter-laden shelves are rooms and rooms and rooms filled with books--so many books that you can lose yourself among them for hours, finding old favorites amid stunning new surprises, many of them signed.
Nobody wears a name tag at Elliott Bay but it's easy to see who the booksellers are, even when they aren't weighted down with books to put on the shelves. They are the people who walk through the place as though it's their home, which, to a degree, it is.
As it is for all bibliophiles--this sprawling, often dusty, historic building that clings to the edge of the world, close enough to a finger of the Pacific Ocean that you can smell it as you browse through books, that will endure as long as there are people who love the printed word encased between two covers. It's Heaven, it's Mecca, it's the Elliott Bay Book Company--and it's waiting for you.
Since it is a Seattle bookstore, I may be the only fool whose cigarette heels became a hostage of the floor--this is the land of sensible shoes where comfort trumps style in a big way and Birkenstocks excite no sneers. I am not however the only person who has come away from the rough-hewn bookshelves with one or two splinters. This may be one of the only bookstores on the planet where a pair of tweezers has a permanent and prominent spot near the cash drawer, and booksellers are routinely asked if they have a band-aid by customers who sport minor flesh wounds from slivers of cedar.
It is a spot that booklovers hope to find when they die, if they are good in this life. Along with the murderous floors and the splinter-laden shelves are rooms and rooms and rooms filled with books--so many books that you can lose yourself among them for hours, finding old favorites amid stunning new surprises, many of them signed.
Nobody wears a name tag at Elliott Bay but it's easy to see who the booksellers are, even when they aren't weighted down with books to put on the shelves. They are the people who walk through the place as though it's their home, which, to a degree, it is.
As it is for all bibliophiles--this sprawling, often dusty, historic building that clings to the edge of the world, close enough to a finger of the Pacific Ocean that you can smell it as you browse through books, that will endure as long as there are people who love the printed word encased between two covers. It's Heaven, it's Mecca, it's the Elliott Bay Book Company--and it's waiting for you.
Wednesday, March 26, 2008
A Modest Disposal
Much weeping, wailing, and gnashing of teeth is taking place over the troublesome issue of Social Security payouts. Baby Boomers are afraid that they'll never receive them, and every generation that follows them is afraid that they will. It is a topic that is divisive, vituperative, and without any reason to carry the weight that it does.
Thanks to the state of medical care in the U.S., we Baby Boomers are dropping like flies. Even those who make a reasonable income and have some form of health insurance are faced with soaring deductibles and expensive prescription costs, which make their friendly family physician more of a luxury and less of a preventative measure every year. And those are the lucky ones--many of us work for employers who can no longer afford to offer health insurance, and yet because we work, we aren't eligible for public health programs. (Let's not even begin to talk about dental work.)
Medicare is years ahead for most of my generation, and that program too is standing on shaky ground. By the time we are eligible for it, it will be such a fragile structure that the sheer weight of boomer medical cases will send it crashing into oblivion.
So Generations X, Y, Z and Less than Zero, cheer up. Thanks to the lack of a sane health care system in our country, the number of Boomers who will be alive and well by the time they're ready for Social Security will be much smaller than the hordes that haunt your worst nightmares.
Who says there's no method to the Republican madness? And with a health system like ours, who needs to worry about Soylent Green?
Thanks to the state of medical care in the U.S., we Baby Boomers are dropping like flies. Even those who make a reasonable income and have some form of health insurance are faced with soaring deductibles and expensive prescription costs, which make their friendly family physician more of a luxury and less of a preventative measure every year. And those are the lucky ones--many of us work for employers who can no longer afford to offer health insurance, and yet because we work, we aren't eligible for public health programs. (Let's not even begin to talk about dental work.)
Medicare is years ahead for most of my generation, and that program too is standing on shaky ground. By the time we are eligible for it, it will be such a fragile structure that the sheer weight of boomer medical cases will send it crashing into oblivion.
So Generations X, Y, Z and Less than Zero, cheer up. Thanks to the lack of a sane health care system in our country, the number of Boomers who will be alive and well by the time they're ready for Social Security will be much smaller than the hordes that haunt your worst nightmares.
Who says there's no method to the Republican madness? And with a health system like ours, who needs to worry about Soylent Green?
Welcome, Crackheads!
My neighborhood is changing. Cheap and ugly condo barns are sprouting in spots that used to harbor brick buildings and cheap restaurants. New apartment buildings that have replaced SRO hotels for the elderly, the down-and-out, and the new arrivals to our shores boast "market-value" rents--and the market they are referring to is quite clearly Manhattan. Pretty little boutiques are sprouting up on unlikely corners, selling imported jeans for $200 and fancy soap in a neighborhood where some residents have no access to a shower. Chinatown is on its way up and out.
I've always wanted to live in the neighborhood that I call home now. It was a place where you could have dinner, go to a play, have a drink after the curtain fell, and then go home--all on the same block--which is my idea of true urban living. It's edgy enough that I was cautioned against moving there, and I have to admit I rarely take advantage of the fact that I can go out to many nearby restaurants until 2 a.m. In fact, if I'm not home before 11 p.m., I make sure I'll get there in a taxi.
At night my neighborhood isn't mine, nor is it anyone's who isn't looking for drugs. It gets rough after 11 p.m.
By the time I leave in the morning, the streets belong to old ladies going to buy groceries, people waiting for the bus to take them to work, a few small children being taken to school. But the signs of the night before are there for all to see, the debris left by people who have little to lose and carelessly drop what they no longer need wherever they're standing when they've used it up. And the alleys are even worse--that's where the human waste is deposited.
And yet if anyone is going to keep our neighborhood an affordable place to live, it's the people of the night who are going to do it. So when I walked out of my building this morning to put my garbage in the alley dumpster, and narrowly avoided stepping into a pile of garbage from a broken garbage bag near my doorstep, I felt a certain elation.
They're here, in one of the few remaining spots downtown where they are still able to live--like me, like the very old men in my building, like the people who shop in the little Chinese grocery across the street where English is a minority language, like the deaf poet who lives in the apartment that adjoins mine who battles with schizophrenia. We, along with the crackheads and the derelicts, are clinging to our little piece of Seattle. We are all equally desperate to remain where we are. But it's the people who make our neighborhood a dirty and sometimes dangerous place to be who are the frontline fighters in this battle. If any group can keep our neighborhood from gentrification, it's them.
Support your neighborhood crackheads! As hard as it may be to admit, we're all in this together.
I've always wanted to live in the neighborhood that I call home now. It was a place where you could have dinner, go to a play, have a drink after the curtain fell, and then go home--all on the same block--which is my idea of true urban living. It's edgy enough that I was cautioned against moving there, and I have to admit I rarely take advantage of the fact that I can go out to many nearby restaurants until 2 a.m. In fact, if I'm not home before 11 p.m., I make sure I'll get there in a taxi.
At night my neighborhood isn't mine, nor is it anyone's who isn't looking for drugs. It gets rough after 11 p.m.
By the time I leave in the morning, the streets belong to old ladies going to buy groceries, people waiting for the bus to take them to work, a few small children being taken to school. But the signs of the night before are there for all to see, the debris left by people who have little to lose and carelessly drop what they no longer need wherever they're standing when they've used it up. And the alleys are even worse--that's where the human waste is deposited.
And yet if anyone is going to keep our neighborhood an affordable place to live, it's the people of the night who are going to do it. So when I walked out of my building this morning to put my garbage in the alley dumpster, and narrowly avoided stepping into a pile of garbage from a broken garbage bag near my doorstep, I felt a certain elation.
They're here, in one of the few remaining spots downtown where they are still able to live--like me, like the very old men in my building, like the people who shop in the little Chinese grocery across the street where English is a minority language, like the deaf poet who lives in the apartment that adjoins mine who battles with schizophrenia. We, along with the crackheads and the derelicts, are clinging to our little piece of Seattle. We are all equally desperate to remain where we are. But it's the people who make our neighborhood a dirty and sometimes dangerous place to be who are the frontline fighters in this battle. If any group can keep our neighborhood from gentrification, it's them.
Support your neighborhood crackheads! As hard as it may be to admit, we're all in this together.
Sunday, March 23, 2008
My Money Where My Mouth Is
Money is a perennial difficulty for me. Like most people, I live from shrinking paycheck to shrinking purchasing power, and rarely spend much on incidentals. Yet today I just sent what for me is a chunk of change to a man whom I think can make me proud of my country again.
For those who are already sick of the latest Presidential campaign, move on to another blog. But if you think that America can fulfill the dream that it was founded upon, please stick with me for a little while.
I've seen too many promising politicians killed in my lifetime, and with them much of my own hope that we can work together to solve our very real national problems. Today I printed out a speech, written by a man who has the courage to address our country's major flaw--racism.--in terms that are nondivisive and compassionate. By the time I had finished reading it, I knew this is a man to bring the U.S. back to a sane perspective on many things--beginning with racial bias, which I believe is America's original sin.
I have sent a small amount of money which I can ill afford because Barack Obama's campaign is nourished by small donations from people who find hope in his candidacy, like me. Please read his speech for yourself at http://my.barackobama.com/page/content/hisownwords
You have nothing to lose except five minutes of your time, and quite possibly everything to gain.
For those who are already sick of the latest Presidential campaign, move on to another blog. But if you think that America can fulfill the dream that it was founded upon, please stick with me for a little while.
I've seen too many promising politicians killed in my lifetime, and with them much of my own hope that we can work together to solve our very real national problems. Today I printed out a speech, written by a man who has the courage to address our country's major flaw--racism.--in terms that are nondivisive and compassionate. By the time I had finished reading it, I knew this is a man to bring the U.S. back to a sane perspective on many things--beginning with racial bias, which I believe is America's original sin.
I have sent a small amount of money which I can ill afford because Barack Obama's campaign is nourished by small donations from people who find hope in his candidacy, like me. Please read his speech for yourself at http://my.barackobama.com/page/content/hisownwords
You have nothing to lose except five minutes of your time, and quite possibly everything to gain.
Sunday, March 9, 2008
The Outsider
I grew up in Alaska during the middle of the last century (my, doesn't that sound distinguished?) before it was transformed from a territory to the 49th state, and when its residents referred to the continental U.S. as "Outside." Residents of the warmer U.S. were known as "Outsiders," a term that was often prefaced with "those damn." They were, to those who had just recently escaped "Outside"themselves, a lesser life form, those pitiful creatures who chose to live away from "God's country" because they lacked the cojones to survive there. Many "real Alaskans" ranked them just slightly below newcomers or "cheechakos" and slightly above "Natives," the indigenous population or the true Alaskans ( who in the 1950s received little recognition for being the owners of the land that "real Alaskans" claimed as their own.)
I always knew I was not a "real Alaskan," and yearned to live somewhere else--somewhere warmer where people understood the value of being well-dressed and lived on something other than moose meat and potatoes. "Outside" seemed a good place to start.
But I was shaped by the attitudes of my time and place. "Outsiders" were well and good in their place but once they reached Alaska? Well, it's not for nothing that the best-selling bumpersticker in the 49th state was for years "We don't give a damn how they do it outside."
One of the few things Alaskan that I feel a remnant of local chauvinism for is the Last Great Race, the Iditarod, when mushers race over 1000 miles to Nome at the coldest time of the Alaskan year. I grew up with sled dogs and the men (yes, in those days they were only men) who mushed them. This is where the Alaskan Natives were undisputed kings, and I cheered on George Attla until the day he hung up his mukluks. It was difficult for me to shift allegiance to non-Native Alaskans, but when Outsider Doc Lombard began to race in Alaska, I began to root for any Alaskan resident who could beat him.
This year I work in Seattle's Gold Rush Museum's gift shop, where window displays are my responsibility and at the moment are filled with all things Iditarod. This is the first year that a woman from Washington state has entered the race, and I've been tracking her progress and cheering her on.
Today as I checked standings, I realized that the two front-runners were both Alaskan residents and that I was supporting a dogmushing carpetbagger. And suddenly I realized that at last I had become one of Them--I'm an Outsider.
I always knew I was not a "real Alaskan," and yearned to live somewhere else--somewhere warmer where people understood the value of being well-dressed and lived on something other than moose meat and potatoes. "Outside" seemed a good place to start.
But I was shaped by the attitudes of my time and place. "Outsiders" were well and good in their place but once they reached Alaska? Well, it's not for nothing that the best-selling bumpersticker in the 49th state was for years "We don't give a damn how they do it outside."
One of the few things Alaskan that I feel a remnant of local chauvinism for is the Last Great Race, the Iditarod, when mushers race over 1000 miles to Nome at the coldest time of the Alaskan year. I grew up with sled dogs and the men (yes, in those days they were only men) who mushed them. This is where the Alaskan Natives were undisputed kings, and I cheered on George Attla until the day he hung up his mukluks. It was difficult for me to shift allegiance to non-Native Alaskans, but when Outsider Doc Lombard began to race in Alaska, I began to root for any Alaskan resident who could beat him.
This year I work in Seattle's Gold Rush Museum's gift shop, where window displays are my responsibility and at the moment are filled with all things Iditarod. This is the first year that a woman from Washington state has entered the race, and I've been tracking her progress and cheering her on.
Today as I checked standings, I realized that the two front-runners were both Alaskan residents and that I was supporting a dogmushing carpetbagger. And suddenly I realized that at last I had become one of Them--I'm an Outsider.
Wednesday, March 5, 2008
Weight for Me!
Mr. Eliot may have claimed that April was the cruelest month, but what exactly is so bad about mixing lilacs and desire anyway? As far as cruelty goes, that ranks right up there with wearing one's trousers rolled and daring to eat a peach--not exactly the stuff that nightmares are made of.
February on the other hand--the weather turns bleak and the IRS turns ugly, what with all of those little tax reminders rolling in, and the flesh that has provided insulation during the winter suddenly threatens to become permanent. Add to that a virus season that lasted for far too long and infected most of the known world and there you are--the winner for the cruelest month goes to...February!
The past month has been virtually unlived by me--wrapped in a tomb of sleep and rousing from it only to do what absolutely needed to be done. Normally I'm someone who has loathed the entire concept of naps since the day I was born--and suddenly my entire existence was one gigantic nap. This is not a life, and this was February.
There's a feeling of wild exhilaration that comes at the end of February, and this year that end was even more welcome than usual. It also brought with it a new appreciation for body fat--when lack of health forces hibernation upon you, replenishing caloric needs is not a high priority. Without my winter fat cells, this could have been an even bleaker February for me, and I now have a newfound appreciation for plump. Plus now that I'm feeling better, food tastes good again--viva le appetit!
February on the other hand--the weather turns bleak and the IRS turns ugly, what with all of those little tax reminders rolling in, and the flesh that has provided insulation during the winter suddenly threatens to become permanent. Add to that a virus season that lasted for far too long and infected most of the known world and there you are--the winner for the cruelest month goes to...February!
The past month has been virtually unlived by me--wrapped in a tomb of sleep and rousing from it only to do what absolutely needed to be done. Normally I'm someone who has loathed the entire concept of naps since the day I was born--and suddenly my entire existence was one gigantic nap. This is not a life, and this was February.
There's a feeling of wild exhilaration that comes at the end of February, and this year that end was even more welcome than usual. It also brought with it a new appreciation for body fat--when lack of health forces hibernation upon you, replenishing caloric needs is not a high priority. Without my winter fat cells, this could have been an even bleaker February for me, and I now have a newfound appreciation for plump. Plus now that I'm feeling better, food tastes good again--viva le appetit!
Friday, February 1, 2008
Derailed in Seattle
A small postscript to my prospective train adventure and a warning to all who buy tickets online from Amtrak: a week before my departure for San Francisco and two weeks after I bought my ticket online, I went to the train station to pick it up. Only after I signed the receipt for it, did the clerk tell me that mudslides had halted the Coast Starlight until February 15.
Since I need to be there by February 8, this was not news that I wanted to hear. Nor was I thrilled that nobody from Amtrak had notified me that my ticket was now unusable. The clerk limped his way through refunding the purchase to my bank card which I can only hope was done with more efficiency than hitherto shown by Amtrak, and I went home to buy a plane ticket, which would have been far less expensive had I done it a week ago.
So take fair warning--we do not have a civilized train system in this country, and those who run it do not give a damn.
Since I need to be there by February 8, this was not news that I wanted to hear. Nor was I thrilled that nobody from Amtrak had notified me that my ticket was now unusable. The clerk limped his way through refunding the purchase to my bank card which I can only hope was done with more efficiency than hitherto shown by Amtrak, and I went home to buy a plane ticket, which would have been far less expensive had I done it a week ago.
So take fair warning--we do not have a civilized train system in this country, and those who run it do not give a damn.
Friday, January 18, 2008
New Train of Thought
Flying in this country has reached the point where it makes traveling by Greyhound look good. I could stand taking off my shoes and using those silly little bottles for shampoo and conditioner if I knew that my flight would be on schedule, that I'd sit in a clean plane, and that the flight attendants would have a little more cordiality than what you might receive from a prison guard at Guantanamo. But since these things have all disappeared as completely as the term "stewardess, " I travel on any U.S. airlines as seldom as possible and have decided that, for my next trip to San Francisco, I'm taking the train.
I know the sole trace of bygone days will be found only in the name of the route, The Coast Starlight, but that is almost enough. I'm sure that the dining car serves Nescafe and that any food will have been rapidly thawed in a microwave before serving. The lounge will have all of the elegance of a MacDonald's with a liquor license, and I'll probably be sitting beside small , insomniac children who are not housebroken.
And yet I'm going to travel through three states at a pace that will be leisurely enough that I can savor the different landscapes. Nobody will tell me to take off my shoes. And there will be a liquor license in that ugly lounge.
Call me crazy but I'm looking forward to this--and if it turns out to be dreadful, at least it will be a good story.
I know the sole trace of bygone days will be found only in the name of the route, The Coast Starlight, but that is almost enough. I'm sure that the dining car serves Nescafe and that any food will have been rapidly thawed in a microwave before serving. The lounge will have all of the elegance of a MacDonald's with a liquor license, and I'll probably be sitting beside small , insomniac children who are not housebroken.
And yet I'm going to travel through three states at a pace that will be leisurely enough that I can savor the different landscapes. Nobody will tell me to take off my shoes. And there will be a liquor license in that ugly lounge.
Call me crazy but I'm looking forward to this--and if it turns out to be dreadful, at least it will be a good story.
Tuesday, January 15, 2008
Letting Go
I never feel as though I'm truly leaving to live in another place until I begin to give things away. It's become a ritual over the years, one that's painful and challenging and absolutely essential. Although I admire people who are able to sell their possessions, I'm too attached to the objects that make my life pleasant to be able to watch strangers rifle through my treasures at a sidewalk sale.
Months before I buy my airline ticket, I have decided what books go to which friend, and who will get my favorite chair. It's a lot like making a will and then being your own estate executor, or (less morbidly) hosting a potlatch, and once I've decided who gets what, the whole process is a lot of fun.
This time I have a cat and he has made this undertaking a bit more difficult--giving him away is somewhat more complicated than presenting someone with a lamp that they've admired in the past. He's a cat with issues, having been removed from his home five years ago to wait in a pet store cage for someone to take him and become his willing slave, which I did and which I am. He's handsome and imperious and an attention-sponge, not unlike, come to think of it, every relationship I've ever been in with males of my own species. I adore him, of course.
He does not, however, travel well. The mere sight of his very expensive, deluxe cat carrier is enough to turn him into the Invisible Feline for hours, and the pitiful cries that he can produce during a brief bus ride are heartrendingly obnoxious. The thought of spending sixteen hours with him in a confined space with other passengers who are trying to sleep their way to Bangkok is enough to curdle my blood and makes me wonder if the people sitting next to me will kill me or the cat first. Then of course there are all of the viruses and parasites waiting for fresh feline blood once we arrive at our destination, which is the reason why I will be going alone.
My sister has offered to give the monster his next home, thereby proving that blood is indeed thicker than the most expensive bottled water and that I am blessed in being part of her family. It's the ideal solution and the cat and I are both lucky devils. The night that she made her magnanimous offer is the first one in which I had an untroubled sleep for a long time--until around 4 a.m. when I woke up with the realization that my sister lives in Alaska so the cat and I still have the opportunity to win hearts and minds on a mournful airlines flight--but not, thank God, for sixteen hours.
Months before I buy my airline ticket, I have decided what books go to which friend, and who will get my favorite chair. It's a lot like making a will and then being your own estate executor, or (less morbidly) hosting a potlatch, and once I've decided who gets what, the whole process is a lot of fun.
This time I have a cat and he has made this undertaking a bit more difficult--giving him away is somewhat more complicated than presenting someone with a lamp that they've admired in the past. He's a cat with issues, having been removed from his home five years ago to wait in a pet store cage for someone to take him and become his willing slave, which I did and which I am. He's handsome and imperious and an attention-sponge, not unlike, come to think of it, every relationship I've ever been in with males of my own species. I adore him, of course.
He does not, however, travel well. The mere sight of his very expensive, deluxe cat carrier is enough to turn him into the Invisible Feline for hours, and the pitiful cries that he can produce during a brief bus ride are heartrendingly obnoxious. The thought of spending sixteen hours with him in a confined space with other passengers who are trying to sleep their way to Bangkok is enough to curdle my blood and makes me wonder if the people sitting next to me will kill me or the cat first. Then of course there are all of the viruses and parasites waiting for fresh feline blood once we arrive at our destination, which is the reason why I will be going alone.
My sister has offered to give the monster his next home, thereby proving that blood is indeed thicker than the most expensive bottled water and that I am blessed in being part of her family. It's the ideal solution and the cat and I are both lucky devils. The night that she made her magnanimous offer is the first one in which I had an untroubled sleep for a long time--until around 4 a.m. when I woke up with the realization that my sister lives in Alaska so the cat and I still have the opportunity to win hearts and minds on a mournful airlines flight--but not, thank God, for sixteen hours.
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