Run for the Borders

Like most Bookworms, I was saddened when I heard that Borders was kaput.
While I admit my local Borders wasn’t something that I frequented because of its nearly-half-an-hour-away location, it always stings me when a bookstore meets its demise.

This is the fourth bookstore that’s closed in Northeastern Pa. in recent years. The first, Tudor Book Shops, really broke my heart a few years back, as it was the place that my parents would take me to religiously every month for years to get the latest installments of “Sweet Valley High” and “The Baby-sitters Club.” 
I’ll never forget the excitement of arriving at the store and running in, where the owners would always have my copy waiting at the counter for me.   

So when Borders announced its liquidation sales would begin this weekend, I was there among the masses, especially because the news screamed that there’d be “savings of up to 40 percent.” While the books I picked up yesterday sadly didn’t fall under that divine sale, I did manage to bring home a big pile of books I can’t wait to get lost in.

What I'll be reading in the coming weeks!

I thought it was due time to get started on reading Charles Bukowski, whose been on my To Read list for quite some time, via “Women,” “Post Office,” “Ham On Rye,” “Hollywood” and “Portions From a Wine-Stained Notebook” (which, truthfully, had me at “Wine-Stained Notebook”). Plus I snagged “Big Sur” and “Desolation Angels” from one Jack Kerouac, whose “On The Road” is the very book that inspired me to go back to school to try this whole writing thing.  

As I waited in the seemingly endless line, it struck me how many people were milling about the store, gobbling up as many books as they could before someone else did. It struck me as kind of funny … where were these people all this time as Borders was going belly up?

As I clutched my seven-high stack of books, I supposed I should have started off asking myself that very same question as I slowly inched my way forward.

NMM