Used Books

Used Books
I was late in discovering used bookshops, unfortunately for me. All those wasted years of buying new books, without the imprint of a former owner. It's like buying a new house, a naked house. You have to add window dressings, customize wallpaper, storm/screen windows, fences, landscaping, a garden house, etc. all this places the touch of your character to the house that someone else buys fifty years later. They get the benefit of your living in the house, leaving your character, your imprint of life. Your stories hang in the corners and are tucked under the front porch. All the little things that take a lifetime to leave your touch on.

With used books it's the same. Ever thumb through a book with tiny written notes in the margins? The reader responds intensely to the author. It's a bonus. Read the inscription on the free front endpaper, a script in ink written by someone with a personal thought to be kept forever by its' recipient. A treasure. Sometimes it's an inside peek at a loving relationship. Let your hand glide over the note, feel the emotion lift off the page. Someone cared.

Small, charming Bordentown City, NJ is a town of five used bookshops. I can just wander from one to another, floating on a book 'high.' Half the fun is in the searching. Sitting on the floor flipping through the pages of an old book, out-of-print for the last twenty years. Finding a book signed by the author is a treat even if it isn't a top name known by everyone. It indicates two people that care, the author and the buyer. It's personal. Now, in the used bookshop, a third person benefits from the original purchase. Try it. Enjoy.