Exit Here

How many times do you have to get burned before you realize that if you stick your arm in the fire it's going to wind up the color of a lobster? Apparently, if you’re me, it’s quite a lot. This weekend, against my better judgment, but in accordance with my resolution to acquire inventory on a steady basis, I attended a library sale as awful as many of its predecessors, but with one important exception -- this time I finally listened to my own inner voice and got the message loud and clear.  From here on in I will never attend a library sale with the exception of the one run by my friend Carol, one in a rural area that bans scanning, one far, far away from here, and one very good one run by a committee of exceptionally competent volunteers. Other than that I’m DONE. I will never again subject myself to anything so degrading even if it means (and it doesn’t) that I will never, ever get any quality books and will be driven out of business.  

As you know, I’ve been adding steadily to my inventory by snapping up online bargains and going to estate sales and auctions. The quality of these new additions is high, but the volume frustratingly low, which is what led me to venture out to a book sale in a Cleveland suburb at 6 a.m. Saturday morning. The roads shined like a window pane and the snow fell so steadily that Eric had to keep brushing the accumulation out of the hood of my coat while we stood in line. But we soldiered on and arrived two hours in advance claiming spaces five and six in line. The good part was we went for coffee with our friends Paul, Carol, and Ed which was both sane and fun. Imagine debating whether a specific scene occurred  in Wright’s Black Boy, or in Native Son with intelligent people who actually read! But of course we eventually had to return to our bags in line and try to ignore the gossip,  bragging, and eternal snipping and sniping.

While we shivered in the cold one of the regulars standing behind me suddenly announced that he was really supposed to be in front of me. My patience with this particular character (who thinks it’s hilarious to fake author’s signatures in first editions and donate them to the library) finally hit low ebb. I know, I know, I know --it’s truly bad karma – but I curtly informed him that we had been there a full half hour before he pulled in beside us. His arch enemy, who was also behind us, agreed with me so  he backed off, which though good, did nothing to curb the crush of the crowd which ended up four people across. I’ve never seen this happen with such intensity before and felt almost panicked at the pressure from the back of the line that jammed people up against me on all sides.

But here's the denouement. When the sale finally began  both the original character AND  his arch enemy stampeded in front of me like a pair of starving rats in a dark alley waiting for the restaurants to throw out the garbage!The quality of the books was minus-two on a scale of ten, but you’d  never have known this by the elbowing, book tugging,and frenzied scanning that took over the entire room. One woman actually crawled under a table and out the other side to make sure she wasn't shortchanged.  Suddenly, sharply, a sense of revulsion so profound descended on me that I actually removed myself from the fray and stood against the wall watching human nature at its most unbecoming. This is not the first time I’ve done this, but I hope it will be the last. After the natives grew less restless I did finally look around a bit and unearthed one good book on the general tables and a small, quite good antiquarian set on the “not-so-special” table for just $5. I suppose it could be argued that the sale was salvaged, but that would  be missing the point.

The thing is,  I don’t like to be curt to people and I feel bad when I am. I also don’t want to be part of a spectacle which was held in check only because a volunteer came outside seconds before the doors opened to suggest that a repeat performance of a previous incident would not be tolerated. The whole thing was ugly, degrading, and damaging to the soul.  I will go to the sales worth doing, but if they descend to this level then I will cross them off the list too. Bookselling is an honored profession with standards and dignity and it’s about time to take a stand for both. Certainly, I’ll miss the occasional three-figure book by cutting back even more severely on library sales, but I  think I’ll survive. Or at least my soul will.