From My Books Area in the Thrift Store
I was excited to find that ^ ship-shape electric clock, standing on top of the Cool Old Books shelves, and the print of Don Quixote too.
The other day a shopper asked me if we had a copy of that book, and I knew our one copy had sold, so I had to say no, which made me sad––not that people expect a thrift store to carry a particular book...
But a few weeks ago, a woman had mentioned Larry McMurtry's Lonesome Dove, and it just so happened I had recently put it out for sale. She was amazed––and so was I.
I don't get to enjoy the coolest things for long––that ship clock sold overnight, ($6.99, a good deal, I thought, though the top of one mast is missing). And the golf lamp sold in a few days--not that I was attached to that, but it was a nice prop.
I write "not for sale" on certain things, but that doesn't work--people take the stickers off and take the item to the cashier as unmarked...
There are a couple things I'm going to write on with paint, because I would be very sad to lose them---a lumpy iron frog, and that canoe bookshelf (that holds Minnesota books), though all my coworkers know not to sell that.
I actually argued with a customer about why he couldn't buy it--he was insistent that everything in a thrift store should be for sale.
I'm stopping with beautifying the area, however, beyond these little things.
Marz was talking about how some people find bookstores intimidating, and while mine is arranged in sections like a bookstore, I hope that its general grunginess is welcoming to all.
The ugly spray-painted shelves, for instance, that came from a video store and that I despaired of at first, I now think are good:
if you love books, they won't put you off; if you find the idea of books a little intimidating, they are reassuringly unswank.
Kirsten mentioned censorship.
I do practice a little of that in one specific area---I have thrown in the garbage a couple books that were old-timey racist:
books about the "happy jungle natives" and "fierce Indian squaws" type of thing.
Julia suggested I find homes for them--perhaps with teachers wanting to teach about how perspectives on race change? I'm open to that, but there were only a couple so far, and it's low priority.
I send to recycle/resale hundreds of pounds of pious Christian books that, frankly, just don't sell.
bink has come twice to sort and put out Religion & Spirituality books, and she puts a wide range out. The section is full up, and it doesn't empty very quickly. Pema Chodron books sell immediately, but not much else.
Oh--and King James Bibles. People have twice asked me for them, and we were sold out! I was surprised, but Marz told me that's a standard for evangelicals.
Unlike my predecessor, I put out all the cool, old little prayer books and missals, and those do sell--because they're cool? or because someone really wants to use them?
I don't know.
I think some of both.
Otherwise, I put out books of across the political spectrum, but recently I culled some Glenn Beck books that were on the shelves when I started and didn't sell over the summer, and some of Michael Moore's too––ditto.
It's not so much censorship as weeding and pruning.
The History/Social Sciences books sell, but could use more space.
Fiction sells, and I can't keep the shelves full---that's why though not a single copy of All Quiet on the Western Front has sold since I started in June, I allow myself the pleasure of having three different paperback editions of it––they make me smile.
