Tag Archives: inspiration

Gone but not Forgotten

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It’s Jack’s Wednesday guest post on a Wednesday – wonders will never cease!

Most bookstores have a cat or a dog and we’re no exception. Actually, we have two dogs and three cats plus however many foster kitties are sojourning with us at any one time.

But this post isn’t about one of our owners. A couple of days ago our good friends Mark and Elizabeth lost their lovable wee dog Suzie. Suzie owned them, their house and every piece of their yard, including the dirt road that passes by it. She clearly regarded that section of road as part of her domain and that it had to be defended against anyone and anything that traveled along it. Our friends went to great lengths to stop her running out after cars, bikes and quads. Despite their efforts it was maybe inevitable that this is how she’d meet her end, but it doesn’t make it any easier.

suzie

Our dogs are escape artists of the seventh water and we have to be ever vigilant when they have access to our front door. There have been many times we’ve had to chase them all over our fairly busy downtown and there’s an irony in that. So far (fingers crossed) our two have survived busy intersections and even wandering down the middle of the street ahead of an enormous coal truck, yet poor Suzie got hit by a car on a mostly quiet country road.

Our bookstore greeter cat Owen had a very narrow escape about eighteen months ago. He now looks both ways before crossing the road and uses the cross-walk (he really does!)

At the best of times we only have them for a relatively short time, so if we are pet owned there will be many times that we will have to deal with situations like this. It’s never easy and there are many times I’ve had a spade in my hand with tears streaming down my face.

Our beloved 14 year old Zora, our black Lab, is showing definite signs of dementia and is losing strength in her back legs, so it could be that we will have the worst decision in the world ahead of us in a few months. Of course as long as she isn’t in pain we are happy to make her ever diminishing world as comfortable and easy as we can. She doesn’t know who we are but she thinks the staff at this home are very nice.

Why do we do it? Subject ourselves to this?

Well – that’s easy. It’s because they give us their unconditional love (well, the dogs do – the cats not so much).

Suzie gave and received much love – she will be long remembered – RIP Suzie. And God Bless Us, each and every pet-owned human out there.

Across the Great Divide – –

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It appears to be Thursday – so time for Jack’s Wednesday guest post –

Among the things I love about bookstores are the quirky things that are often displayed on high shelves, or hanging from ceilings or just pinned to any spare wall spaces. We’re no exception – we have paintings and posters, tea towels and even a bag from a Chicago Borders branch the day they closed for good. Hanging from the ceiling of our ‘Mystery and detective room’ are model planes I’ve built over the years.

Mingled in are family photographs, including two of my Granpa, Peter Ferguson, and they are very frequently the subject of conversation with customers. Because he was a coalminer from the time he left school (aged fourteen) until his mid-twenties. This is a coalmining area and so is the place I come from – just one of the many connections and parallels between Scotland and Appalachia.

Granpa worked in a number of deep mines in my home county of Fife in the late 1800s and early 1900s, going down a deep shaft in a cage then walking, often for over a mile before crawling on hands and knees to the coalface. Eventually he had some kind of accident and decided he’d had enough. He got a job delivering lemonade to corner shops around the area and continued to do that until he retired. First of all he used a horse and cart, then an early truck with an open cab and solid tires before finally graduating to something more modern.

grandpa young

That’s Granpa kneeling on the left being trained for the mine rescue team in 1900.

When his wife died just before I was born at the beginning of WW2 he moved in with us, as my Dad had joined the RAF and had been posted to Egypt. So he was my father figure for the first years of my life and I remember him with great affection. He walked me to and from elementary school, supplied us with fresh vegetables and made great oatcakes and scones. He provided our first TV and first washing machine.

One of the reasons he got us a TV was because he was an avid reader of western novels and had discovered that the lone ranger was a serial on this new-fangled thing. Later he upgraded us when the Virginian came along! I remember clearly him sitting in his favorite chair either reading or singing to himself. He had two special very traditional songs he rotated – The Wee Cooper o Fife and The Muckin o Geordie’s Byre. I’ve often said that his voice was in my head when I started to sing these kind of songs many years later.

Sadly towards the end of his life he developed a cough and was diagnosed with ‘black lung’ – a legacy that finally caught up with him and he died in the bedroom that we shared.

What I remember isn’t the sick old man but the friendly guy who had a lot of time for this kid. And that special bond that sometimes develops between those who skip a generation. He was my first best friend.