I've always loved reading and could spend hours in a good book store, digging through the stacks, looking for something new to catch my eye. SF/Fantasy/Horror for the most part, but branching out into the Classics, Theatre, History, even Language occasionally, as I'm sometimes fascinated by the English language and how it got to be what it is today.
And I still WANT to love going to book stores. Despite the genericization of the Borders/Barnes & Noble superstores (can anyone tell them apart from the inside? Or from the outside, for that manner, once you get past the neon signs.) I miss the little independent bookstores like Dangerous Visions or Dodd's in Long Beach, or the little neighborhood hole in the wall used book store I could find in every place I've lived. I keep thinking I'll do a search for book stores near the house to see if there's anything in the area, but I'm afraid I'll find out there isn't. (I just succumbed. A quick search of the neighborhood near me reveals, in the first 15 results, 12 Christian book stores, a magazine publisher, a comic book shop and something called "Bloodgood Books" which, for all I know COULD be another Christian book store.)
I even really liked Borders, when I first discovered it… imagine it, this huge building just dedicated to books! I was in heaven. That is, until Borders and B&N became the only book stores you could find anymore. Interchangeable book stuperstores (interesting slip of the typing there) with all the warmth and personality of an IQ test. Not that I hate these places. I just wouldn't mind more options, you know?
But, I digress. As I started to say, I used to love going to the book store. Lately, I'm beginning to dread it.
The problem, really, is the new books display. Specifically, it's the preponderance of knee-jerk, partisan politics being shoved in my face the instant I walk in the door.
The smirking faces of the neo-con press scream out at you…
It doesn't matter that I agree (occasionally) with all those liberal "what's happening to our country" writers. Their mere presence just encourages the likes of Hannity and Coulter, who feel the need to slap anyone that doesn't agree with them down as traitors or worse, terrorist sympathizers! GOD, spare me this crap!
And yet, every time I walk in, there they are, setting my teeth on edge and making me dread eye contact with others mingling in the store, for fear they'll try and tell me how good one of these diatribes is. Then I'll have to restrain myself from the urge to throttle them for forcing me to engage in any discussion that revolves around these tracts. They've infected my center of calm with their neighing and braying and barking at the moon antics.
I want my safe haven back, my escape from the politics of the real world and the maddening din of the city. I'm not going to get it any time soon. But it doesn't mean I don't miss it.
And I still WANT to love going to book stores. Despite the genericization of the Borders/Barnes & Noble superstores (can anyone tell them apart from the inside? Or from the outside, for that manner, once you get past the neon signs.) I miss the little independent bookstores like Dangerous Visions or Dodd's in Long Beach, or the little neighborhood hole in the wall used book store I could find in every place I've lived. I keep thinking I'll do a search for book stores near the house to see if there's anything in the area, but I'm afraid I'll find out there isn't. (I just succumbed. A quick search of the neighborhood near me reveals, in the first 15 results, 12 Christian book stores, a magazine publisher, a comic book shop and something called "Bloodgood Books" which, for all I know COULD be another Christian book store.)
I even really liked Borders, when I first discovered it… imagine it, this huge building just dedicated to books! I was in heaven. That is, until Borders and B&N became the only book stores you could find anymore. Interchangeable book stuperstores (interesting slip of the typing there) with all the warmth and personality of an IQ test. Not that I hate these places. I just wouldn't mind more options, you know?
But, I digress. As I started to say, I used to love going to the book store. Lately, I'm beginning to dread it.
The problem, really, is the new books display. Specifically, it's the preponderance of knee-jerk, partisan politics being shoved in my face the instant I walk in the door.
The smirking faces of the neo-con press scream out at you…
Liberals Eat Babies!While the self-mocking/mournful liberals shout out
Republicans Hate PuppiesIt's enough to make me run as fast as I can to find a safe haven, far from the invective.
It doesn't matter that I agree (occasionally) with all those liberal "what's happening to our country" writers. Their mere presence just encourages the likes of Hannity and Coulter, who feel the need to slap anyone that doesn't agree with them down as traitors or worse, terrorist sympathizers! GOD, spare me this crap!
And yet, every time I walk in, there they are, setting my teeth on edge and making me dread eye contact with others mingling in the store, for fear they'll try and tell me how good one of these diatribes is. Then I'll have to restrain myself from the urge to throttle them for forcing me to engage in any discussion that revolves around these tracts. They've infected my center of calm with their neighing and braying and barking at the moon antics.
I want my safe haven back, my escape from the politics of the real world and the maddening din of the city. I'm not going to get it any time soon. But it doesn't mean I don't miss it.
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