Category Archives: bookstore management

Circles of Words

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Jack and I are getting used to people making lunch reservations, or sometimes just showing up at the bookstore, saying they read the book and had to see the place live. At first, we were a little shy. Believe it or not, that outgoing Scotsman can be tongue-tied around large clumps of people. And me, I’m an introvert.

But there’s something very nice about people who want to see your place because they think it sounds “charming” or “sweet” or even “too good to be true,” or who just want to “meet those cats, Beulah and Val-Kyttie.” (Beulah likes meeting people; Val-Kyttie does not.)

So Jack and I set down a “soup, salad, shortbread and tea supper or lunch” menu and started taking reservations that include chatting, singing, browsing, help with other town attractions: whatever the visitors-to-be want. Mostly people come in book club groups, but we also get girlfriend posses.

Friday past, three couples ate with us and did some browsing, then went on to the outdoor drama of Trail of the Lonesome Pine. I never did figure how Pendy, Jill and Vernelle (and I’m sorry if I’ve butchered the name or spelling!) fit together as a reading group since they were all from different states, but they were a lot of fun. Unfortunately they were the ones taking all the pictures on the day; my new iPhone doubles as a camera, but I can never find the thing when it’s needed.

Vernelle made me a bracelet of tiny paper beads with words on them: a circle of words celebrating people brought together by words. Isn’t it pretty?

word bracelet Words bring circles of different kinds of people together. Saturday, the phone rang and a lady from Oregon made a reservation to meet us in October, when she’d be driving by on her way to the Atlantic coast.

Oregon?!

On Sunday (when we aren’t open) I was straightening the porch when a car pulled up. It was Barbara–the lady who opened her own bookstore about 40 miles away, for those who’ve read Little Bookstore. Out with her mom and daughter for a drive, she just stopped to say hi. We chatted awhile, but as they were leaving another car pulled in.

“They open?” the woman called to Barbara, who turned to me, eyebrows raised.

“No, but come on in,” I shouted back, and the lady and her husband climbed the porch steps.

“I’m so glad you’re here,” she said. “My husband and I live in Cincinnati, and we were passing through for a family funeral, and when I saw how close we were gonna be,  I told him we had to just stop and see the place. I read your book by accident, and I just loved it. It was like you read my mind!”

Turns out she’d been trying to order a copy of the novel Big Stone Gap, but “all those things you said about small towns? Amen, sister!”

It’s fun, this people visiting thing. You just never know what’s gonna happen next.

Hame, Sweet Hame…

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Jack’s back! And so is his weekly Wednesday blog post.

East, West, hame’s best! (That’s “home” fer those amang ye wha’ cannae speak Scots.)

Ah, but which hame?

Avid readers will know that I take a group of Scotophiles over to the old country every June. This year was the sixth such trip and it was as enjoyable as ever – a lovely group of seven folk (should have been eight but one had to call off at the last minute for health reasons). We were carried all round Scotland and the North East corner of Ireland in the trusty seventeen seat bus driven by our equally trusty driver and co-guide Colin Stuart, meeting such talented and interesting people as Liz Weir, Pete Clark, Jock Duncan, Doli McLennan, Robin Morton and Alison Kinnaird. (Look ’em up; you’ll be glad you did!)

I always go a few days early to stay with Colin just outside my hometown, Dunfermline, but every year when I drive through the place I find they’ve added another roundabout and another couple of traffic lights – it’s a complete nightmare. Buildings that were much loved landmarks have disappeared. In other words, it’s not my home any more.

Meanwhile, back in Big Stone Gap, Wendy waits quietly until I depart before organizing all our friends into a work-crew and completely re-organizing the bookstore. I get hints via email and blog posts, but it never really prepares me. I may not come back to new roundabouts and traffic lights, but shelves have danced ’round about to new positions, she does a lot of traffic with yard sales, chairs have descended the stairs, and half our furniture is waiting patiently in the basement until I complete the work down there.

In other words, it’s not my home any more….

But you see what I said there? I mentioned friends – on both sides of the Atlantic. Ah – now friends are a lot more important than roundabouts, traffic lights, buildings and furniture. So I still have two hames, in the East and the West, and will have as long as I have friends there.

Then there’s that special friend who waits ’til I’ve gone before re-organizing the bookstore. Wherever she is, is truly hame!