JUST ASK DON’T TELL DON’T TELL JUST ASK

Customer walks into a bookstore and asks, “How much do your books cost?”

Customer walks into a bookstore and asks, “How do you know where everything is?”

Customer walks into a bookstore and asks, “Is this a liberry?”

Customer walks into a bookstore and asks, “What do you have all these old books for?”

Customer walks into a bookstore and asks, “Have you read all these books?”

Customer walks into a bookstore and asks, “Do you actually make a living, doing this?”

And so on.

Well, the bookstore is Reed Books Antiques/The Museum of Fond Memories, and these are representative questions asked us practically every week for more than twenty years.

I never know what to answer.

When I’m feeling Bugs Bunny-ish, I make a wisecrack—just to entertain myself (“Yep, I’ve read every book here–except for that one!”).

But I’m learning over time (maturity is highly overrated) that a lot of people don’t have a sense of humor—or they don’t have my sense of humor, and think I’m just being a wise guy, which, after all, Bugs Bunny is, right?

Besides, many of the questions are asked by customers who don’t know what to do, once they’re inside the store. Some of them have never been to an old bookstore, some have never voluntarily read a book from cover to cover (no kidding—they brag about it), some actually mis-read the sign and think it says Free Books (thus the library question), others have been told by librarians that any book more than seven years old should be de-acquisitioned (thus the old books question), others don’t see lots of folks lolling about drinking coffee and eyeing other customers (thus the make a living question), others don’t associate computers and databases with old books, thus the know where everything is question.

I try to assist these folks and am sometimes successful in making them feel comfortable.

I do enjoy the anthropology of it all, but I’m also grateful for folks who come in and get excited about the fact that we are a wonderful emporium of memories, dreams, reflections, thoughts, feelings…a bumper car-turned-rollercoaster kind of place where anything can happen, where anything can find you and beg you to adopt it, if you’ll only just stop and listen for a mo’

© 2009 A.D. Jim Reed

www.jimreedbooks.com

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