Is this synchronicity, or what?

Yesterday I took the #4 subway train from Jerome Avenue, and last week Bill Bratton resigned as top cop in Los Angeles. As we used to say in San Francisco, rolling our eyes and nodding meaningfully, "Oh, wow."

About fifteen years ago, I parked my car by Woodlawn Cemetery in the Bronx and walked down Jerome Avenue to take the #4 in to East 86th Street. Afterwards with my errand completed, and just in time to get to a plant morphology class at the Botanic Garden, I returned to my car.

As I walked by the cemetery main gate, I began to see books littering the ground. Muttering tsk-tsk to myself, I bent over to look at them and realized -- in horror -- that they were 150-year-old botany books I had borrowed through the state library system ... and they had been thrown all over the ground! I rushed to the car and saw a broken window, wide open. As I gaped, a passerby said to me, "I hate when that happens."

Well, me too. I opened the car and began to paw through it. As usual, it was packed with stuff going here or there or to be used along the way. I thought the botany books were the worst: I was working on a history of plant taxonomy, using very old sources. Fortunately, titles over a few hundred years old had to be used in the Botanic Garden's library. But I gagged to see the casual mishandling of the lovely old books.

On the ground was the box which had held a camera lens I had bought the day before. But! I had immediately put it on the camera, now sitting safely on my desk. So, a disappointed vandal.

But no. I had had a thermal cold-bag containing some cycad seeds I had borrowed to take home to photograph. I swore my life away for permission to take them off the premises. They too were gone. But I brightened -- they were poison! Just let some vandal think they're a new kind of kiwi fruit, and heh-heh, no vandal.

As I went through the very back of the car I realized my greatest loss. I had been working on two 24"-square needlework pieces for a couple years. They were when-I'm-done-with-these-I-can-die projects, using 16-point canvas and 24 shades of red, brown, gold, and green silk thread. One was a variant on a 17th century Hungarian point design, the other I had drafted from a Indian rug I'd photographed at the V&A. The Indian design was finished, all 576 square inches of it, and there were only a couple square inches to go on the Hungarian design. The two pieces, all the silk, and my grandmother's embroidery scissors were together in one bag and that bag was gone. What a blow.

Forgetting my morphology class, I went back down to the cemetery gate and found a gatekeeper, and explained what had happened. "You've got to call the police," he said. He decided I was too upset to dial. "I'm calling the forty-seventh," he told me. "They're always really helpful when we need something."

The desk sawjint, um, sergeant, picked up. "New Yawk P'lice, four-seven," he said. I explained that my car outside Woodlawn Cemetery had been broken into, and stuff inside was stolen. "Whereja say the car is?" he asked. Outside the cemetery on Jerome Avenue, I explained, you turn right outside the gate and walk about a hundred yards. The sergeant was audibly relieved. "That's not us," he said, "you want the five-oh." And he gave me the number.

I called the five-oh. I explained my problem and told him the four-seven said it was the five-oh's jurisdiction. "What's he tawkin' about?" asked the exasperated desk sergeant. "The five-oh ends at the center line of Jerome Avenue. We're to the west. You call the four-seven back and tell them it's their jurisdiction."

I explained all this to the Woodlawn gatekeeper, and dialed the four-seven again. "Ma'am, I tolja it's the five-oh," said the desk sergeant.
I corrected him. "The five-oh says their jurisdiction ends at the center line. They're west of it," I explained.
"Ma'am, I know this is tough," said the sergeant, "but I'm telling ya our precinct boundary's at the Jerome Avenue eastern curb. I know this. You're not parked up on the grass, are ya?"
"But the five-oh says theirs ends at the center line," I wailed.
He paused and you could almost hear wheels turning. "Well," he said doubtfully, "maybe it's the five-two. You could try them." He gave me the number.

The Woodlawn gatekeeper looked on in disbelief. "I always call the forty-seventh and they couldn't be nicer," he said.

I called the five-two and explained my predicament. "They said what? They said it's the five-two? Where are you again?" I explained I was a hundred yards north of Woodlawn's main gate. "We're nowhere near there," he said, "I don't know what's wrong with those guys."

Well, neither did I, and I was late for class. I very much hoped the thief was sitting somewhere dead, preferably in the four-seven, with a half-chewed cycad in his mouth. As I walked out of the caretaker's cottage, off in the cemetery I saw a flash of neon pink -- just the color of the missing thermal bag the cycads had been in. Maybe my needlework was discarded there too! I hurried through the cemetery and found the cycads, still in the thermal bag, but the needlework was not to be found.

After class, I went home, stewing about the fact that I had no place to report a crime. Given the high deductible on my insurance, a police report might not be useful. But, darn it, I wanted this to be a New York City crime statistic. I decided to tell my story to Rudolph Giuliani, then a not-much-loved NYC mayor. I told Rudy the story I have just told you, then, as I licked the envelope, I thought, Why not tell William Bratton?

Bill Bratton was easily a lot of people's idea of a cop's cop, but he was also a people's cop, heading the New York police department after a career in Boston. Regional residents noted the city's falling crime rate and gave his up-to-date policing the credit. He was definitely a popular favorite, so I wrote to Bratton as well.

Within a week, I got a nice letter from Bratton's office telling me that they had determined the correct precinct and reported the crime for me. And a week later, Giuliani fired Bratton; the general view was that he was jealous of Bratton's good press. No, I never heard from Giuliani's office, nor did I hear from the precinct.

I hope that somewhere in the Bronx, an elderly mama got my needlework, accompanied by a fishy story she chose to believe, and loves it. I think of her often, as I did yesterday when I once again went to Jerome Avenue and parked to catch the #4 train. A street sign has been added: it reads "Albany next right" and it's not the allegory it sounds like; the Thruway passes nearby. I no longer do needlepoint: I knit instead.

Jerome Avenue was named for Sir Winston Churchill's mother's family. In the intervening years, of course, Rudy Giuliani has become a Sir too, and next month, Bill Bratton -- just retiring from the job of L.A. top cop -- will be created a Commander of the British Empire by Queen Elizabeth. So if that's not synchronicity, what is?

I mean, oh, wow.

Why Blogger needs emoticons

There I was shelving fiction when a pleasant-looking young guy with a beard approached. "Do you have the Sleeping Beauty trilogy?" he asked.
"You mean by Anne Rice?" I asked. "Only under another name?"
He consulted a note. "Yeah, that's the one. My friend told me I'd like it."
I took him to the R's. "Well, here's volume 1," I said as I pulled the book from the shelf.
"I'd like all three books," he said.

So I excused myself and went into the stockroom. Anne Rice's Sleeping Beauty trilogy must be among the books most shoplifted from Bookstore C everywhere, and I wanted to check whether any were shelved safely in the stockroom. Unsurprisingly, I found volumes 2 and 3 and took them out to the customer.

"I thought they were all in one book," he said.
I explained that the three purchased together were the same price as the single volume.
"Well, then I'll only take the first one," he concluded. "What else can you recommend?"
"What are you looking for, exactly?" I asked, puzzled.
"Oh, a couple good books ... I'm going on vacation and I need stuff to read. Maybe some thrillers. You must know what's good," he added.
"Are you looking for more things like Sleeping Beauty?" I asked.
"You know, I don't really like Anne Rice's other books," he said, "but my friend told me I'd like these books. But, you know, whatever," he explained precisely.

"Do you know that the Sleeping Beauty books are BDSM porn?" I tried.
"BDSM? What's that?" he said, clearly puzzled.
:: oh, brother ::
"Bondage, dominance, S&M ..." I said.

Now this is why I could use emoticons right now. Because honestly, words fail me. But if I could simply run through an entire range of emoticons, I'd maybe convey what happened to this guy's face when I said that. "Smileys" are not what I have in mind. He opened the book at random and read for a minute. He turned absolutely crimson. He cleared his throat. "Well, I will take volume 1 and see why my friend thought I'd like it," he said. "What else do you suggest?"

So I took him through fiction and hand-sold a couple other books and sent him on his way. When I went back to the R's a half-hour later, volumes 2 and 3 were gone as well.

That's the cover of the Penguin paperback of volume 1.

We all know why we prefer independent bookstores, right?

I shouldn't bite the hand that feeds me, but let me tell you -- as if you didn't already know -- why you should always, always, always support the indies*.

I work in one of the big chains -- hence, "Bookstore C" -- and I have pleasant stories to tell about customers and the other staff. But here's the A #1 Big Colossal Giant Supersized Humongous Capital P >>> Problem: almost every single decision about the store is made by Bookstore C Corporate.

This plays out in many ways and, given the desire to keep staffing at a minimum (and believe me, the difference does not show in my pay) it works well. For instance, every display you see in Bookstore C is designed by Corporate. If you walk into one of our stores and there's a display of, oh, bookmarks, that display will have been designed by Corporate, and is in every single Bookstore C in the U.S. and Canada that week. The sign and the spinner come from Corporate, and every single bookmark on the display was chosen by Corporate, AND Corporate will send along photos of where every single item on the display will be placed. Nothing is left to chance! Nothing.

So here we are in the Hudson Valley, and the start of the Henry Hudson Quadricentennial celebration was last week. We have a display of related titles, chosen for us, with a sign sent along for the display, but -- here's the catch -- it's missing that great little book about the Palisades that the Beczak Environmental Education Center published. Of course. Small publishers don't count, even though the catchment area for this branch of the store includes more than half of the people who look at the Palisades every day of their lives. Important note: There is no big-publisher book about the Palisades.

So where Bookstore S**, right here in Hastings-on-Hudson and now alas gone forever, carried books by every writer around***, it doesn't seem relevant to Bookstore C Corporate management that my branch has all these writers living within a few miles. Bill Holstein published a book just a few months ago, Why GM Matters. Bookstore C did not feature this local writer's book, nor did it ask him to do a program or sign books or anything else. If I sell a book by James Howe or Alyssa Capucilli or Roni Schotter or Steve Kanfer (just as a f'rinstance) I comment to the customer that the author lives in Hastings or Yonkers or wherever. Why doesn't Bookstore C promote this?

Last week I noticed a customer carrying a list and scanning the shelves anxiously. Could I help? "I'm looking for books by Helen, Helen, um, Helen Bar--, Bar-- oh golly," she said, "let me check her last name. I keep getting it wrong."
"Helen Barolini?" I hazarded.
"That's it!" she exclaimed happily. "Do you know her work?"
"Not only do I know and love her work, but I'm having dinner with her tonight****," I said.

The customer was just about overcome. She took my hand. "Tell her I love her," she said. And -- since Helen's wonderful books are not big-publisher books -- we went to the computer and she ordered Chiaroscuro, A Circular Journey, and Their Other Side. The book of Helen's that had created such devotion? Umbertina, which of course Bookstore C doesn't carry either.

Here's the other side of the picture. My first day at Bookstore C, I noticed a stack of Ann Coulter books on the front table. In the section, the newest and second-newest Coulter books were in double stacks face-out as well. In the several months since I started working there, there have been stacks and double face-outs of Bill O'Reilly's latest book. Currently the front table has two huge stacks of something with Ronald Reagan's name on the front cover, and also of two Glenn Beck titles. One day I was cleaning shelves near the Coulter books and my hand-held personal computer terminal beeped when I scanned them. Unsold, they'd sat on the shelves so long that the central computer told me to return all but one. That very day, another dozen of the same title arrived.

Well, hey -- has Bookstore C Corporate noticed that New York is a blue state? That Westchester County is a blue county? That my branch of Bookstore C is located in a town that has virtually no November election because if you win the Democratic primary, you get the job? It's not relevant for Bookstore C Corporate. Those unsold books by Reagan and O'Reilly and Beck and Coulter sit there gathering dust; personally, I have not sold one of them. These books adorn best-seller lists, which don't take into account what will be mammoth returns from Bookstore C. If our local managers selected books, these stacks would not be here.

I did not look for this when I started working at Bookstore C. It just became apparent to me after a while.

Umbertina cover from the Feminist press CUNY edition.

* Friend-from-ninth-grade Jane, who was at Copperfield's in Santa Rosa for twenty years, insists that she can never work at a chain for these reasons.
** Bookstore S = sui generis, Good Yarns Bookshop
*** Is there a lesson here? In order to survive, must bookstores ignore small publishers and local connections? The answer seems to be yes.
**** The Literature Club's 100th Anniversary dinner

Raymo, the gentle giant

High school classmate Ed e'd us all today to tell us that Raymo had a massive stroke and is on life support. It's strange to be with someone daily for twelve years, then never see them again. Ray and Eddie and I were classmates for twelve years, which then, seemed like forever; which it was. Ray was 6'3" and a bear of a guy, but he wasn't called Bear, he was called Raymo, who knows why.
His mom died when we were perhaps in our early 20s; she sat in the bleachers through every basketball game he ever played in. It was a tossup whether our team was as good as its record, or maybe Raymo's mom scared the opponents into losing! She put body English and every other kind of English into her fandom. Despite her ferocity, Ray was far from ferocious, he was a good sport and a good sportsman. He followed in his dad's footsteps as an ob/gyn, practicing in North Carolina after med school at Case Western Reserve and a residency at Mayo.

I had a real affection for Ray after a bad sixth-grade day. It was right before the end of the grade period and we had a substitute teacher. One of her tasks was to check our reading lists. On a separate notebook page, we had to keep a list of each book we read, one book per line. Most kids had at least a couple of books, some had ten or twelve -- I had six pages filled with books. One by one, we went to the teacher's desk to show her our lists. She looked at mine, pushed her chair back and stood up, her face grew crimson, and she yelled, "What is this? What are you trying to do?" Clearly she thought I was trying something on. The rest of the class fell silent. Then Raymo raised his hand and volunteered, "Oh, she read those books -- Diggitt always has book lists like that!" and then the rest of the class started to agree with him and spoke up too. Sometimes I have wondered what the sub would have done to me if Raymo hadn't spoken out. Unlike certain other alpha males in our class, Raymo was almost protective of me, even though we didn't know each other in anything other than a distant, across-the-classroom way. That's just who he was.

Follow-up: Raymo died Friday, June 5. The 6th was our graduation anniversary.

Statistics now prove that Mother was wrong. You can look it up

Today’s NY Times tells us there’s a 100% correlation between women nominees for the U.S. Supreme Court and having read Nancy Drew as a kid. Yes! Sandra Day O’Connor and Ruth Bader Ginsberg and now, Sonia Sotomayor all read Nancy Drew when they were grade-schoolers.

In my family, it was a given that Nancy Drew was trash, a waste of time, and … something only badly-bred little girls read. To prove the point, Mother would draw on her sister Betsy, director of circulation for the Youngstown Public Library System, to confirm that none of the libraries in the system bought Nancy Drew books. Or for that matter, the Hardy Boys or Judy Bolton either.

So my memories of reading all those series are of books smuggled from friends and also from the libraries of older residents, people who had bought the series for their children who were now grown up and moved away. The series books I read were the oldest ones, all published by Grosset & Dunlap, of course, with covers barely hanging on and loose yellowing pages, musty smelling.

The most powerful memory called up is of visiting the Wynn family. Across US 224 from our farmhouse, a lane headed straight north for about a mile. Near its end, it dropped into a small grove of trees and there the Wynns’ ramshackle farmhouse squatted. Its lawn was full of rusting tractor parts and cars on blocks, and the front screen door was missing its spring, but I went back and back and back because I was always welcome to draw from their vast library of Nancy Drews and the others.

With my mind full of hardened criminals anyway, the walk to and from Wynns' was scary. Flat Ohio fields stretched away on both sides, and as the summer sun baked down, the only sounds would be the endless buzzing of bees, the occasional caw of a crow over the fields, and a far-off tractor. The sound of highway traffic would mute before I was halfway there. But I’d brave the silence and the solitude because the walk home with an armload of Nancy Drews was such a pleasure.

Why Bookstore C? and keeping score

When Lydia first moved to Chicago, she worked at a big used bookstore of the sort one finds near a big university. In her LiveJournal, she referred to her employer as Bookstore X. After several months, Lydia left temporarily to take up an internship at White Wolf near Atlanta. She was told Bookstore X would keep her job for her. But they didn't! Fortunately, she walked across the street to O'Gara & Wilson and got a better job. But she refers to her employer now as Bookstore Y because there already is a Bookstore X.

Well, I once worked for Bookstore S (for sui generis, here in Hastings-on-Hudson but no longer, alas, in existence). So, I decided, I now work at Bookstore C, for Chain bookstore.

Bookstore A would imply a bookstore that's primus inter pares, and I don't know what that would be -- the once-upon-a-time WordsWorth in Cambridge, perhaps? The old Scribners? I know -- it would be the campus bookstore I frequented during college. Not the college bookstore, the independent bookstore. I remember -- probably incorrectly but lovingly -- that it had a wall of Signet Classics. I bought a new paperback of Defoe's Diary of the Plague Year for 35 cents. And of course there were no orange or green spines because Penguin paperbacks were not sold in the U.S. in those days.

Bookstore B could be either Barnes & Noble or Bankrupt Borders. So Bookstore C it will have to be. I am not sure bookstores have the wonder in them they used to have back when they were rare. And boy -- the thrill of spotting an orange or green spine in a used bookstore! But that's another story.

This dude dies 'n' goes to hell

Last night, I was working at the cash desk in Bookstore C, and a young man of about 20 came in, accompanied by his posse. Booksellers and customers looked around uneasily as this crowd walked to the poetry section in the back of the store.

In a few minutes the group came to the cash desk, and I could see that the young man -- clearly their leader -- was buying Dante's Inferno. "Is this for a class or are you reading it for the heck of it?" I asked, wondering which answer would surprise me more.

"It sounds interesting," he said bashfully. "One of my teachers said he thought I'd enjoy it."

Some of his friends muttered as he said that. He turned halfway around to them. "Seriously!" he said. "This dude dies 'n' goes to hell 'n' this is the story of what happens. Mr. [teacher's name] read some of it to us in class the other day and it sounded cool."

He and his dozen friends left the store. I thought, y'know, I like that -- the gang is out on Friday night and they take time to drop by Bookstore C so one of the guys can buy Dante!

(De-) Mythologizing our stuff

It’s been 18 years since my parents’ house was sold and the contents came to be with me in Hastings-on-Hudson. I lived in a five-bedroom house and everything fit. But when I moved to my small but wonderful apartment in 2001, a lot of their things had to go into storage. I have paid tens of thousands to store antiques and books! A lot were my dad's, and I saved them because they were his, and because well, maybe someday Lydia would be interested in birds. But she isn't a bird person, and Daddy has been dead nearly twenty years. It truly is time to move on.

What I decided (after years of lugging these books around) is that unless I am prepared to make selling them my career or avocation, I have to let someone else do it. Lots of our generation are looking to make a killing. Surely our parents' jewelry, furniture, china, books, silver, whatever has some value, right? It did to them. They counted themselves prosperous because they had it all.

There's a lesson here somewhere, and remind me to find it when I have time. All this stuff has value in the aggregate as holder of myth, image, story. You put all this stuff together in one house, attractively held together by an individual's self-image, and it tells you that person's story. She was cultivated, he was an intellectual, he was this, she was that. Take away the person -- or someone who is willing to act as caretaker to the myth -- and there's no myth. Just stuff. That's why books wind up on ABE for $7.91 (including $3.99 S&H) and dealers in old stuff have rooms full of silver teapots.