I'm often asked the question, if I believe in God, or any god. I often ask myself what I believe in, if it can be categorized at all. Buddhism,Confucianism, or any other ism. I've come to the conclusion I don't like being told what to believe or how to believe it. So far, what I've learned by myself is, there are things that are unexplained, things that can just be chalked up as “what are the odds?”, and things where you just can't help but call a friend and say “You're never going to believe this!” and then there are moments where you sit back and you can't say anything at all, your in awe. Your not sure what happened, how it happened, or why. You just know it did. You rarely tell anyone, you just know that it was something. Today I had a “You're never going to believe this!”. And after this incident no matter how shmaltzy or overdone something looks in a movie, or reads in a book, I'm giving that writer the benefit of the doubt. Being the long winded man that I am, I'll tell you the long version of the story.
It was the day after Thanksgiving and as much as I love my family, I can't be around all of their “unique” personality quirks for too long. For those of you who don't know; the Zabinski/Thompson/ Bishop clan consists of my brother, sister, mother, grandmother, Buddy the cat, and Bella the “dog”, and my six foot-four, two hundred and fifty pound self. Now imagine all of us sardined into a one bedroom apartment. So to combat my cabin fever I talked my brother into coming with me to drop off the library books (that they never read) and to maybe sit down with him to figure out a way to get him into any kind of literature. Little did I know, the city of West Allis apparently observes Black Friday as a holiday and was closed. Since I didn't feel like going back we took a tour of the downtown shops, seeing if we could find a book store where I could accomplish the aforementioned task.
We stopped at a little shop that, frankly had one too many gun magazines, posters, and paraphernalia for my comfort. The cherry on top was a “We don't call the police.” wooden sign, complete with a hand carved revolver. Oh, and the science fiction was next to the adult section. “Ender's Game” was three inches from a Playboy that featured ex-WWE wrestler Chyna on the cover. Social profiling! I was also disheartened by the best sellers rack: does anybody read anything that doesn't have to do with Vampires? I guess I should be happy people are reading at all. Anyways, I asked the lady at the counter if she had John Steakely's “Armor.” I've been having problems finding that particular book off my reading list. She told me check out this half price books and records store a few blocks down, she also warned me it was a bit “cluttered'. The look on her face when she said “cluttered” should have been a red flag. Her lack of hesitation or any other kind of warning gesture was comforting, so I avoided the obnoxiously loud man on the phone, talking about how he's “gunna make Jimmie's fight look like a kiddie fight if he doesn't shut his damned mouth .” and was on my way.
We stopped at a little shop that, frankly had one too many gun magazines, posters, and paraphernalia for my comfort. The cherry on top was a “We don't call the police.” wooden sign, complete with a hand carved revolver. Oh, and the science fiction was next to the adult section. “Ender's Game” was three inches from a Playboy that featured ex-WWE wrestler Chyna on the cover. Social profiling! I was also disheartened by the best sellers rack: does anybody read anything that doesn't have to do with Vampires? I guess I should be happy people are reading at all. Anyways, I asked the lady at the counter if she had John Steakely's “Armor.” I've been having problems finding that particular book off my reading list. She told me check out this half price books and records store a few blocks down, she also warned me it was a bit “cluttered'. The look on her face when she said “cluttered” should have been a red flag. Her lack of hesitation or any other kind of warning gesture was comforting, so I avoided the obnoxiously loud man on the phone, talking about how he's “gunna make Jimmie's fight look like a kiddie fight if he doesn't shut his damned mouth .” and was on my way.
No words of warning would have prepared me for what I was about to walk into, admittedly none of those words would have kept my stubborn self away anyways. The first thing we see before we even get into this place, is a man staring us down as we approach the door. He had that odd look certain people exude, the “I probably shouldn’t leave any valuables, and/or small children unattended.” type of vibe. He looked like a chimney sweep from Mary Poppins, except he didn't do any kind of song or dance, he just blocked the door. We assumed they weren’t open yet because the lady on the other side of the door just stared at us blankly. We started to walk away and the chimney sweep yelled “She's open!” and opened the door a lot like he was possibly a bellhop before his current occupation of unsettling guy in front of the not yet known to us even more unsettling store. So Zach and I literally squeeze past this guy and the blank expression lady. Only to have her flag us down.
“Leave your bags at the counter.” Me, being the sensible man that I am, looked for some sort of desk or table. If there was one it was very possibly covered by a guesstimate of eight hundred books.
“Where?” I asked.
“Oh, just leave them here.” she said sweetly. So we did. We finally departed the entrance way 'o' books and stumble into the “store” if you can even call it that. I did some neandering as I usually do, letting my ADD get the best of me. Until I noticed there is no rhyme nor reason to the organization: the VHS version of “Uncle Buck, was bungee corded to a bookcase housing a couple dozen vinyl records, which was also happened to reside next to a stack of Stephen King novels (and books written under his Richard Bachman alias that I thought was pretty neat.) I fought it hard not to be cliche and do the whole “this place is strait out of one of these” joke, but alas I couldn't resist. Ok, I thought. This can't be as bad as it looks, there has to be some catalog, or system I'm missing.
“Excuse me, how would I go about finding a particular book?”
“You'll just have to look.” She answeres. I gave her my blank, single-blink “are you joking?” face, it was the least rude thing I probably could have responded with at that point.
“It's a science fiction book.” I tried to clarify.
“There are some books there, there, behind me and over there.” I would like to say she gestured but she really didn't. It was then I got a decent look at her. Her body was small and boxy, she wore her hair like she was the bride of Frankenstein; minus the hairspray, and her wardrobe was mix between gypsy nomad, and a seventies burnout. She was definitely to old too be a hippie, so the only logical conclusion my brain could fathom was she was indeed the pioneer of acid.
“Uhmm, Ok, Thank you.” I replied. She smiled at me with missing teeth, her eyes peering through her rose tinted glasses, as I partook on my wild treasure hunt. I found my brother playing with a giant stuffed dog and pony; that happened to be right in between a slew of random fiction novels, and by slew I mean stacked a few rows back and meeting me at eye level. Leave it to my brother to find the most non-book related thing to do. Until of course the horse started randomly playing music. Needless to say we left that corner fairly quick. Something else that was weird during our excursion was that we kept passing the front end, wandering through the vast clutter of the store, and there was an ever cycling single dirty magazine that kept changing as we walked by. Not Playboys either. Hardcore, full frontal, bondage, all of the above; a different one every time we walked by that same same spot. My brother couldn't help but mention the revolving door of porno, and I couldn't help but quietly laugh my ass off. We quickly realized we weren’t going to find what we where looking for when the proposed sections to search where all three books deep, where blocked by heaps of text on the floor, garbage bags full of stuffed animals, random artifacts of clothing, and step ladders. We did find some interesting books tho, she had an immense collection of Isaac Asimov, and most of the “Dune” series. I took a quick video of one of the rooms, which was probably the most organized of them all. I honestly wish I could rent that place out and film something, anything. The longer you spent in that place, the more unsettling it became.
So we decided to leave, finding nothing we wanted at that moment. We where leaving empty handed, and had slung out backpacks; ready to walk out. The storekeeper was having none of that. She proceeded to try and sell me something, her body language showed she was nervous. I felt bad, I really wish I had the money to take a few books off hee hands. But, then she brought out the big guns.
“Are you into adult magazines?” she prodded. I didn't responded. Zach let out his signature laugh-scoff
“I got adult movies too.” I began to say no thank you, but she kept insisting, and she was blocking the door. So I obliged. She pointed at the flimsy plastic file cabinet. I went to grabbed the top drawer and it was definitely stuck.
“Just tug it real hard.” I saw the cabinet sway from just my light pull. Just what I would need, a hundred dirty movies falling all over causing a catastrophic tidal wave through out the store. So I smartened up and yanked a different drawer. To the comedic delight of my little brother, it was titled something to the effect of “Takin' It to Brown Town!” or “No Place like Brown Town!”. Either way I shut the drawer and expressed my gratitude for her hospitality, until she gave us enough to wiggle past her and out the door. Fresh air blasted our nostrils clearing it of the overwhelming sandstorm of dust that we kicked up during our needle hunt. We laughed and commented freely on our way back home. It was the most ridiculous moment that I've had the privilege(?) of experiencing the past year. But, as outlandish as it was I really wish I could have helped out the poor lady, burnout or not. It would take the better part of the decade for any system of organization to be developed, and I'm sure anyone with the slightest of allergies would be at a major health risk. It's just oddly inspiring that amidst the likes of Barnes and Noble, Amazon, and the advent of E-readers that she's can even stay open, although I don't know for how long.
Truth is at the end of the day, the thing that I believe most, is people will never cease to amaze me. Our intricacies, our flaws, our accomplishments. How we can take things to new heights, innovate, conceptualize, or we can be destructive, selfish, and malign. Humans are as unique and breath taking as anything you'll see in the most exotic of places. You just have to open your eyes.
