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Life, actually…

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TEMPLE BELLS

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This is the way it was one Saturday in my little corner of Down South,

a mere thirty years ago:

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Standing in a stranger’s front yard under a bright sun on an early Saturday morning surrounded by good ol’ boys and poofed-hair women may not be my idea of how to spend an hour or two of increasingly precious spare time. But you know how us booklovers are—we will go anyplace anytime under any circumstances to see whether there is a nice old volume or two worth adopting.

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This is, of course, before the internet, before the smart devices, during olden times of landlines and Yellow Pages and following verbal directions to get where you want to go.

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So here I am, back in days of yore, on somebody’s lawn in the middle of a cluster of middle-aged-ups who are sniffing and poking a Lincoln Town Car that will be auctioned off along with household goods.

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Small wisdoms and unsolicited observations are being passed around like hot potatoes. I have the idea that these are mostly poker-players, what with their stoic expressions and hands-in-deep-pockets attitudes…trying to appear dis-interested and reserved, but watching everything out of the corners of their eyes.

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A faint but persistent tinkling provides our soundtrack, overriding everything so consistently that it is all but unnoticed.

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Finally, I realize that the almost temple-bell-like noise is coming from pockets, where fidgety fingers continuously rattle loose change and car keys and good-luck charms and old tokens.

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The bells will last till after the auction.

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The house on the property is filled with anonymous tire-kickers who have never known its former occupants. And here all these pokers and prodders are, walking about, exhuming previously-loved belongings that no longer belong to anyone, no longer belong to the people who first purchased them with great excitement, with great expectations that life would be slightly changed for the better as a result of each purchase. That life would forever be different and special if this object were possessed and kept nearby.

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People sit on chairs and leave grass stains on old carpets and exhale their stale internal airs, invading the once personal and very private atmosphere that not so long ago thrived in this village.

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Somebody’s past, somebody’s story, is about to be sold to the highest bidder, piece by truncated piece. For a moment I feel like an interloper, an invader, a trespasser. But really I am just a preserver dedicated to finding just the right thing to rescue and adopt and offer a safe home. In memory of absentee family. In honor of all those magical-thinking objects we all cherish and discard, cherish and discard.

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I can never rescue all the books in all the estate sales throughout the planet. And ain’t that about the most interesting way for a bookie like me to paddle though life?

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Cherish is the word I use to describe the feely feelings that arise when I complete my Saturday mission

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© 2024 A.D. by Jim Reed

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Life, actually…

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MISTER FIDGET MAKES MY DAY

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Mister Fidget skulks around inside the bookstore, picking up and examining items at random. He is always in motion, asking about this object and that object but never waiting for a complete answer from me.

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He is busy looking for the next thing before ending his perusal of the previous thing.

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Fidget is entertaining and annoying and restless. But he is a customer, and each customer is treated with respect and kindness. Each customer has something to teach me. I try to pay attention while going about the business of keeping the shop afloat.

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As he rambles about, never quite leaving each item at its original site, he talks and chatters and speaks in one continuous sentence. I can’t keep up with him but he does come up with oblique observations.

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“These pants are too tight.” He tugs at his trousers fore and aft. “You can’t get a wallet in and out of them, dammit!”

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He does go on.

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“Maybe they make these pants tight so that nobody can pick your pocket.” This idea might have some validity.

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“Boy, this is not a very good block here.” He refers to the Downtown streets where I ply my trade.

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“I can’t find any good parking places.” I wonder how he got to the shop without finding a parking place.

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“Wow! this bookstore must not have many customers down here, huh?” He is adding to the popular myth that the city is barren, a wasteland left over from the flights of the 1960s. In truth, business has never been better, and the urban township is sort of booming.

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He scattershots through the rows of vinyl records on display. “Wow, these records, some of them are broken, did you know some of these records are broken?”

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He carefully waves a chipped disc into the morning air to prove his point, never considering the fact that I, the little old storekeeper, handled and placed every single record on display myself.

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“Oh, look, here’s a record, it’s part one but there’s no part two, do you have part two?” I do have part two but he’s already on to the next shopping critique.

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“You don’t have as many records as you used to.” He immediately spies the next enormous rack and says, “Oh, look, you’ve got a whole lot of records.”

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Mister Fidget runs about the aisles talking out of earshot, not aware that he is his only listener.

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I go about my chores and help other customers. Eventually, Mister Fidget exits the establishment, promising to actually purchase a book or record when he gets his next check.

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Some store owners express annoyance at such folk, but not I. He is just as important as the next browser. That’s because he takes something valuable with him—he will tell others about his adventure. Others will tell others. Eventually new shoppers will appear, having heard something nice about this wonderful old museum of fond memories.

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Every fidgeter who comes and goes carries a message to the village at large. That’s why I do my utmost to engage with everybody, be they sightseers, tire-kickers, comparison-shoppers, curiosity seekers, explorers, readers, non-readers, tag-alongs, collectors, decorators, bargain hunters, wheelers and dealers, touchy-feelies, nostalgia ramblers.

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How they feel about the way they were treated at Reed Books will lodge in fond memory.

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And maybe, just maybe, they will mention us to others who care deeply about kindness and sweet reminiscence

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© 2024 A.D. by Jim Reed

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Listen to Jim’s podcast:

 http://redclaydiary.com/mp3/hairtodaygonetomorrow.mp3

or read his story below:

HAIR TODAY, GONE TOMORROW. 

I miss my hair.

I don’t miss barbers.

Yep, one day many, many moons ago, I had a full head of hair. Now, though, I still have lots of hair, it’s just that it’s everywhere but atop my head.

I have alarmingly fast-growing hair in my ears, my nose, on my face, on my back, on my chest, and, well, just about all over. And its rate of growth is not full-moon dependent.

Nature has a sense of humor—most of us start out bald and toothless, and we end up…dead.

Now, I know lots of guys who still go to the barbershop, or even the hair stylist, long after their heads are virtually bald. Guys with a little fallen halo of hair rimming half the head from ear to ear, still go and get it trimmed. I guess they’re holding on to every shred of dignity they can.

I don’t blame men who have enormous comb-overs. Others laugh at them, but I laugh at the laughers, who will begin losing hair long before they’re prepared to. I don’t even mind guys with ridiculously obvious toupees, since they, too, are living in the same fantasy world occupied by large-beehived women and three-strand-combover men.

So, does not having any hair mean you’ll never again go into a barbershop or hair salon? I asked one hair stylist in the Big City that question and gave her the challenge.

We brainstormed together.

If you are baldheaded, what can you get at a hair styling place?

1.  You can get your beard shaped and styled.

2.  If your baldness extends to the face, you can ask for a trim–of your nose hairs and eyebrows and ear hairs and that weird hair growing out of the top of your beauty mark.

3.  You can get a therapeutic massage and stop worrying about baldness for a few minutes.

4.  You can just have your bald pate buffed and shined or powdered or perfumed. Flaunt it! 

5.  Maybe the most fun you as a baldheaded man can have is to bring family—kids, grandkids, cousins and spouse or friend—to the hair place and sit there and thumb through the pages of beautifully coiffed models in the magazines, and just watch and enjoy the banter  and fun.

Full-head-of-hair guys, beware: an experience like this could make you want to shave your head and join the rest of us sexy devils.

Incidentally, I haven’t been to a barber since 1985, nor have I had a professional hair cut since then. But if I do start going to hair stylists/designers, I’ll let you know. Well, actually, you’ll know because I’ll smell funny for a few hours. What I really liked about hair salon places is that, unlike barbers in my day, they didn’t discuss politics and sports and hunting and fishing and a thousand other things I have no interest in. They did gossip, but gossip is more like entertainment—more interesting than watching all that internet detritus. 

By the time you leave the joint, you look better than you really are.

What more could anybody ask?

Just asking

© Jim Reed 2024 A.D.