Put your money where your mouth is

Driving with my friend Laurie to the 5-spot this morning (home of the best salmon scram in the world) I was mourning the death of one of my favorite bookstores in Seattle, Bailey Coy Books. While it was the death of a tradition...back in the days when I lived on the "hill" I would eat at one of my favorite haunts (Paggliacci's pizza or Angel Thai) and grab a coffee at vivace before taking in the books at Bailey Coy. I would stroll among the new release and staff recommendation tables, pickup and turn over the books in my hands, read the jackets covers or the back of many, before carefully choosing the 1-2 out of at least 5-10 I wanted, that I would in fact purchase. Deceptive for its size, it was the only really small bookstore that had the selection I liked that was both current but seemed to keep some of the classics I wanted.

Beyond the sadness I feel that I can no longer lose myself for hours or parts of days among the few stacks at Bailey-Coy Books, is a rising fear for other independents I love. This year in the Bay Area where I now live I am struggling to come to grips with the loss of Cody's in Berkeley and Stacey's in SF. It harder now to get to an independent bookstore to spend my money, and if they disappear completely then I will need to transfer my affection to one of the giants or the behemoth Amazon which is now more of an online mall than just a bookstore.

I will give Amazon credit it blows the doors open for people who didn't have access to books before - so now if you have an internet connection and a mailing address or a post box you can get almost any book under the sun.This I believe is a good thing, especially if you live in a place where the censor books.

but I digress...

Driving to breakfast with Laur I shared an idea I've had to fundraise for independent bookstores. Public schools are doing it now - because the public money that used to fill the coffers is too thin to give every kid the current books and materials for learning, and in wealthier districts the parents raise even more money. They actually seem to want their kids to be able to have a library, history and physics classes - not just NCLB's math and English - and things like field trips - fancy that. Libraries are doing it too - in San Francisco we have the Friends of the Library Foundation - go figure.

So while I understand my idea flies in the face of most concepts of capitalism, I would've put down 100 or even 200 dollars last year to if it would've saved Bailey Coy - and I don't even live here anymore. Why you ask, would I do such thing? Because I think Bailey Coy made Capitol Hill, more interesting, it opened doors to knowledge and exploration, it started conversations and lines of inquiry. Its curators carefully selecting great books for people to not just buy, own, or turn over in their hands, but to experience, to take home, to learn from...to stop people in their tracks and exclaim in their heads (or sometimes out loud) "Wow, I never knew that!" I understand I have a deep and abiding love of books, which some - most - people do not share, but I have laughed out loud in the middle of Bailey Coy, and then usually had to explain myself to other shoppers, and more than once I've cried because a line or a subject so touched me, I've sat on the stairs in back, hoping passersby wouldn't notice, as I remembered a sadness, a love lost, a moment found, something beautiful enough to give me pause. Books move me, what can I say, except that they do.

So why wouldn't I pay money to keep a beautiful place like this in existence. If we live now in an economy where the "unnatural selection" that occurs through open markets and competition doesn't allow for places like this to exist, why not fundraise? I know its silly, they need help making enough profit, and capitalists would argue that their business model needs to be updated. I don't know much about that, but I know I love books and I hate thinking that in my lifetime I will watch all the good ones die. Like opera, symphony, ballet, art museum, are there no powerful benefactors that just want the model or a small bookstore to survive. There's something that happens to people when they walk inside, when they start the conversation about some book they see, its and experience worth saving, and frankly its one I'll never have online at Amazon.com.

I find myself now in the many varied stacks of another Seattle favorite - Eliott Bay Book Company - in its new location. When I heard they moved from their fantastic old location in Pioneer Square location, I thought "Oh no! there just one step away from their own demise...no way this can be good." but now that I am here I am less afraid. It feels like a smaller location, but I do not sense they have lost any of their books - there are still shelves upon shelves, section upon section, and I am now lost. I am astounded now by the number of books that have been published about reclaiming the food chain on the heals of the slow food movement and Food, Inc.

I sit now upstairs at a long table trying to decide which books to buy. I had said I wouldn't buy any books here, because I didn't want to have to shove them in my luggage and carry their weight home with me...but there is no good place for me to get them anywhere near my house or work in the Bay area. So as I ponder which Julia Child biography to buy, and whether I really want the latest installment from Tracey Kidder (Mountains Beyond Mountains being one of my all time favorite books) I remember my conversation in the car.

Some of my friends, those who know I have a "problem" buying books, would say I am simply rationalizing my next big purchase. I share my affliction with Nick Hornby (who has actually published three books on the subject) who puts it best: I suffer from buying far more books than I can ever read. Affliction, sickness, overindulgence, selfishness, or simply a love and passion for book - whatever you label it - I want these beautiful places to stay alive in the world. So today, I put my money where my mouth is.


In the spirit of Nick Hornby:

Books purchased this month (some in SF):
Strength in What Remains - Tracey Kidder
Julia Child: A Life - Laura Shapiro (gift)
My Life In France - Julia Child and Alex Prud'Homme
Mastering the Art of French Cooking, Vol. 1 - Julia Child, Loisette Bretholle, Simone Beck and Sidonie Coryn
Overcoming Speechlessness: A Poet Encounters the Horror in Rwanda, Eastern Congo, and Palestine/Israel - Alice Walker
Mom: A celebration of Mother from StoryCorps - David Isay (gift)
Emotional Awareness: Overcoming the Obstacles to Psychological Balance - H.H. Dalai Lama and Paul Eckman, Ph.D.
The Cellist of Sarajevo - Steven Galloway
The Passport - Herta Muller


Books read the month:
If the Buddha Dated - Charlotte Kasl, Ph.D.*
The 9 Steps to Financial Freedom - Suze Orman*
My Life In France - Julia Child and Alex Prud'Homme*
The Cellist of Sarajevo - Steven Galloway*