the gentle madness

Where we discuss:

• The catharsis of 4/16
• The Walmart effect
• Summer comes too early
• Remodel update
• Shelfari

Huh. Thought this was a commentary about books, coffee and all that. Blaahgh about that. But I can’t write about the books I read without writing about the things that drive me to the books I read. Take Flight, Sherman Alexie’s perfectly timed novel about large-scale violence and introspection. This book ended up in my hands thanks to a customer who pointed out the striking graphic on the cover of a silhouetted gunman against a background of target rings. He (the customer) apparently assessed our ignorance of the wretched murders on campus and enlightened us to the inappropriateness of the positioning of this book on our shelf. We just weren’t paying attention. We had callously missed this display. We were too busy running around, serving coffee, keeping people away from windows, locking doors, adjusting the volume on the radio for updates as the numbers climbed from two to twenty to thirty-two, when we should have been worrying about our image. What happened next explains everything you need to know about why we keep working, why we find books and put them out for you to also find:

I bristled, I recoiled, and I reacted unpleasantly. And then I bought that book, took it home, and read it cover to cover. In agony over the senseless killing on Virginia Tech’s campus I buried myself in a book that was the worst book and the best book for that moment. It is not a Great book. It is a very good book. It devolves into cliche at moments. At other moments it embarrassed me for my ignorance of Native American political and social issues. It reminded me that I have weighed violence, been injured by violence, participated in violence, and turned away from violence. Some people don’t turn away. Some people embrace violence. We must figure out how to disturb that embrace. Removing visual, written, and spoken examples of violence is not part of the answer.

Walmart is already here. There should be a filter on the petition websites circulating in Blacksburg email inboxes to prevent anybody who has ever shopped in the Christiansburg Walmart from signing. It won’t happen, and yes, you should be able to change your mind. But there is a wild, hypocritical animal running loose in this town.

Some Blacksburg residents, like Margaret Breslau, have been speaking out about the Walmart Effect for years. Margaret has also been trying to do something about it through her amazing, tiny economic engine called Homebody. She was part of the driving force behind Blacksburg’s fundraising dinner for hurricane Katrina relief (along with Mike Soriano, owner of Champ’s, another shameless capitalist who emptied his freezers to feed people and raise money for New Orleans residents he’s never met.) Margaret has been present at every important grassroots event since the earth cooled and became inhabitable. I would guess she has read Barbara Ehrenreich’s books. If she is willing to publish her reading list, I will post it here. In the meantime, shop at Homebody. Unless you need fifty pound boxes of Puffed Rice.

The Math Emporium grinds down. Summer is here. Summer in a college town is different from summer at the time-share or your favorite fishing hole. Summer starts early. This year it starts earlier than ever. Today is reading day (I love that label) which means last night was The Crawl and today was The Creep. The Crawl is when you say hello and goodbye to every bar in the ‘burg. The Creep is when you muster the strength to go to your favorite coffee shop and order a bagel and coffee or some other food you can keep down. You give over your money with hands so smudged with ink it as if you tried to mail your fists and had the stamp hand-cancelled by a drunk carp. Need to read more? Caroline Knapp’s Drinking: A Love Story is a start.

The Easy Chair Bookstore’s new home is almost ready. Seriously.

The people behind Shelfari have apparently been scanning my dreams. I’m sure I will get some kind of nocturnal royalties to spend. The Amazon connection sucks, but check it out anyway.

Thanks for reading.