A few months ago, one of my old coworkers invited her Facebook friends to visit the Jolly Olde Bookstore, which was closing in the summer, completely extinguishing the old, used bookstore species in the Tri-City area. People mourned in the comments, talking about how half their bookshelves were filled with books bought from this store, about how nice the owner was.
The picture above is not a very good picture, but I think it captures the way it looked as I drove past it for the first time. On the corner of a tucked away street, next to industrial fences, an empty parking lot, and similarly old and run down businesses. I remember being struck by the giant “sale” sign in the window: how much cheaper could used books be?
As I entered, it looked exactly as I expected it would be. Old, dingy, crammed with tattered paperbacks and yellowed pages. The floors–what little exposed of them there was–creaked as you walked on them. Stacks on shelves, on the floor, and boxes, probably also filled with books.
“Is there anything I can help you find?” asked the man crouched on the floor, sifting through some books.
“No, thank you, I’m just looking around,” I told him.
“Good,” he said. “Because I wouldn’t have been able to help you find anything you were looking for, anyway.” He punctuated this with a laugh, and I laughed, too.
My first favorite bookstore was a used bookstore, and I never went there looking for anything specific. Do people ever go to used bookstores with a map? Or do they just forge trails into the unknown, knowing that any path they take will lead to someplace wonderful?
I had $20 in cash in my wallet, so I told myself that’s what I would limit myself to. I didn’t check prices as I picked up books. I assumed I could know when I was close.
I picked up four books. From the Canadian literature section, I picked up Shani Mootoo’s Cereus Blooms at Night. Mootoo had been interviewed by the non-profit where I’ve been interning since January.
In the “new arrivals” section by the front, adjacent to the Canadian literature shelf, I found Geek Love, by Katherine Dunn, whose death announcement had been made on Book Riot. I was intrigued by the title of the book that I had never read when I first saw the announcement.
In the literature section in the back room of the store, I picked up A Portrait of the Artist as a Young Man, by James Joyce (under the cover was the penciled in, and then scratched out price of $5; beneath it was scrawled, “some notes + underlining, As is $3.00”, as if additional thoughts and observations detract from the value of a book). I also refrained from taking a very large and heavy complete collection of the works of Charlotte and Emily Bronte.
The owner of the store saw me walking around and clutching the books to my chest. “Not going to leave empty-handed,” he commented.
“Of course not.”
In the poetry section in the shelf that blocked one of the entrances to the room that housed the literature section, I picked up a collection of poems by Dionne Brand, whose work I read in my Canadian literature course last year.
Knowing that I had homework to do, I pulled myself away to the table at the store’s entrance that worked as a checkout counter. The owner sat down and took my stack of books. He scribbled on a notepad, did some math, and named a price.
I heard six something dollars. Unsure if he said six or sixteen (it couldn’t have been just six, surely), I handed over my twenty.
He gave me my change: some coins, and two five dollar bills. I had budgeted for twice what I had bought!
In the shelf behind him was an enormous Yale Shakespeare. Golden, with white embossed text on the spine, I knew I would want to come back for it if it was still there.
“Tell your friends to come,” he said. “We still have lots.”
I assured him I would.
As I left, I couldn’t believe that it was the first time I was visiting the store. I had a month and a bit left to visit before the doors closed forever, so I knew it wasn’t goodbye, but it’s terrible falling in love with a life that has an expiry date coming up soon.
I don’t believe that people are reading less. I do think that people are not buying books in person as much anymore, but I know that people still love to read, and I know that people still love physical books. I don’t think that will ever change. But oh, how I wish beautiful souls like this bookstore would live forever.