Christmas without Borders

For the past three Decembers my crafty wife, Liz, has been a craft vendor at the SOWA holiday market.  This year’s holiday market is tomorrow, Saturday the 9th. In the past I went with her and hung around if she needed me. More often than not, she didn’t. So I would take a brisk walk over the Pike to Copley Plaza and Back Bay.

There I would camp out in the Borders on Boylston and do some of my Christmas shopping. I would spend a couple hours browsing the current releases, checking out the new-in-paperback table, and trolling A to Z through paperback fiction. I always had a list of books to buy family members. Luckily for this book lover everyone in my family reads. That includes sisters, bro-in-laws, and, to a degree, niece and nephews. Like any fancy big box book store, this Borders also had a decent collection of graphic novels and movies. This is not a plug for Borders, obviously, since in the past year all Borders locations have been liquidated.

Borders was never my favorite bookstore. Borders had no feng sui. I would walk through the front door and be hit with inappropriately placed tables with no flow. Book shelving that was oblique or inconsistent. I smelled a corporate evil amid the stacks. The idea that one person, possibly a committee, decides which books all stores of a franchise should carry is a chilling deception. I know Barnes & Nobel has one buyer, one woman who decides on the book selection. Maybe she has great taste. But no one person should be the arbiter, the gatekeeper, of culture.

Well, that’s another argument. We can all go indie if we don’t like it, so there’s no use complaining.

So then anyway, that brings us to tomorrow. When I drive Liz into the holiday show, will I stick around for the day as I’ve done the past three years, this time searching for a new store? (I know of a bookstore well up Newbury Street, but that’s a pretty long walk. There may be one or two in the upscale Copley malls.) Or will I turn around and drive out to Brookline or Somerville?

The Borders on Boylston was the perfect destination. After I collected my books, I could order a sandwich in the coffee shop (microwaved and rubbery) and of course drink as much Seattle’s Best as I could stomach. Then, dazed, perhaps zapped by consumerism and air freshener and a comprised stomach lining, I’d stumble through the matrix of Boston streets back to the SOWA holiday show to check on Liz.

Yes, bookstores are closing every day. And yes eventually those printed pages between covers will become rare. But, publishing is still a big business, and books are still printed and consumed. The generation brought up with Harry Potter and Twilight may be the last to appreciate the experience of waiting on line to buy a new book by their favorite author. It’s all too easy to buy all the books you could want online, or, if you’re not into the analog, download e-books or audio books. Still, for now, books have a place in our consumer society. And there are millions of readers who are unwilling, just yet, to part with them.

As for Borders, maybe they screwed up. Maybe they dodged left without a plan when Barnes & Noble dodged right with the NOOK. Maybe the marketplace demanded fewer bookstores (although about 40% the Borders locations are being filled with the even more middle-of-the-road Books-a-Million). I was a fan of Borders one time each year, otherwise I would go to Barnes & Noble or, when I had the time to make the drive into Boston, Brookline Booksmith, Porter Square Books, Harvard Bookstore, or Newton to New England Mobil Bookfair, and more often now that my mom is back on the Cape, Main Street Books in Orleans.

I do not rejoice when any bookstore goes down. I will miss Borders. Especially tomorrow. But I'll find another bookstore. Hopefully I always will. Sorry Virginia, there is no Borders this year.

A Writer’s Downtime

I didn’t write this weekend. But I did help Liz at her final craft show of the year. The SOWA Holiday Market. But it doesn’t mean I wasn’t furthering my writing. I sat behind her table of beautiful handmade items and watched people. People-watching is a great way to help build a stable of characters and character traits. What do real soccer mom’s look like? (Thin, harried, sandy blond hair, worn down.) What kind of hats do twenty-something city-dwelling women wear in the winter? (Tie beanies, Berets, Cabbie caps.) What kind of lipstick do grandma’s wear when they’re out of the house? (Vivid red, thick. Or none at all.)

We were set up next to a woman who sold hats and head bands with feathers on them. All weekend women tried on these items and primped in mirrors. I realized as I watched this very feminine process, that I was witnessing actions usually only saved for intimates. That is, seeing a woman prepare in the mirror is an intimate act, her behavior a delicate display of hair teasing, with subtle head and shoulder canting as she presents herself in the best light to see if she looks good in a hat. Or a head band with flowers. You’d be amazed at how many women want a head band with flowers. These are all details I saw and had the opportunity to write down, or commit to my data base memory of character details to call upon during my writing.

There was also opportunity to collect dialogue by overhearing snippets of conversations. I learned that people who knit are patient. I heard one end of a cell phone conversation: A young man repeatedly told the phone that he couldn’t do it today. Maybe tomorrow, but definitely not today. If he had known ahead of time, maybe.

I saw how parents dealt with children. Some parents hold strong command over their child’s every move. Some make deals to try to keep them satisfied, striking compromises and promises. One of my jobs was to block access to my wife’s wares from clawing, sticky children. At one point I saw a six year old boy break away from his family and run toward our table. Unbound, he aimed for one of Liz’s high-end necklaces. She interrupted the boy’s momentum by saying, in a friendly but firm manner, “Hi, I made all those beads!” The boy stopped, looked up, and realized he was being watched. The fun was over and he withered under our attention, giving his mother enough time to track him and pull him away.

What else does this ‘downtime’ do for a writer? Well, now I can set a story in the cutthroat world of craft shows. I’ve learned about the behind-the-scenes shenanigans. The backstabbing and competition between vendors. The heartbreak of making shitty money or the rejoicing at breaking records and selling all but two cupcake pincushions. I’m already considering storylines starring some of the characters I met this weekend.

There’s that young woman with black rimmed glasses and the stylishly sloppy hair that stayed in any position she prodded it into. Maybe she’s a vendor who sells stuffed dogs and she’s kicked up a fierce competition with the older vendor who wears thick red lipstick, whose specialty is stuffed cats. Maybe these two women join forces against the vendor who needle felts replicas of human fetuses. Maybe, as it turns out, the baby fetus vendor is sleeping with the stuffed dog vendor’s husband. If I don’t want to keep the craft show milieu, then I can transplant my characters. How about the woman who looks just like a Kennedy? Take her out of the Holiday Market location and move her down the street to the Pine Street Inn shelter where she’s mistaken for a lost Kennedy granddaughter. Hilarity ensues. Maybe tragedy. Depends on my mood.

The craft show is two days and one evening. It’s a busy show and Liz does well. I help by being her support system. I bag merch and fold receipts and make change. By Sunday the buyers dwindle. Maybe everybody’s at Mass. Or sleeping in. Or walking their dogs. Maybe I could write a story that takes place on a cold December Sunday morning. Two weeks before Christmas. The lonely crafter oversleeps, and wakes alone. Then he harnesses up his two adorable terriers and walks them down the block. To Mass. After that, he’ll hit the craft fair to buy Christmas gifts. Hmm. Needs work.

Late Sunday afternoon and I’ve put away my notebook in preparation to pack up Liz’s booth. Swooping past our booth on her way to check out the human baby fetuses I spot Ms. X, my erstwhile Grub Street instructor. I shout her name, Ms. X. Ms. X come back! She hears me and doubles back. We’re pleasantly surprised to run into each other at such a non-writerish event. It’s good to see a walking talking working writer outside of her writing nook (I’ve never been to Ms. X’s house, but don’t all writers have nooks they write in?). She says she’s taking a day off. I know Ms. X is busy working on her second novel (she’s got a crazy Spring 2009 deadline) so I don’t ask her how her writing’s going. None of my business. She checks out Liz’s wonderful stuff. Then she asks me how my writing’s going. It throws me, this question. I stammer, “Um. Gosh. Well, I’m working on some short pieces.” And it’s true, that. But what I don’t get around to telling her is: I have some new characters in mind and some hot dialogue and some topical character descriptions. And maybe a couple new storylines to try out. All because of a little writer’s downtime.