Tuesday I went to pick up some books from a lady in her eighties who is cheerfully ‘putting her affairs in order’ because she has a deteriorating heart condition. She looked healthier than I felt and her brain certainly works more usefully than mine. I was there for nearly two hours whilst she gave me detailed accounts of the contents of almost every volume. They are all non-fiction, mostly travel and many (unfortunately for me) published by one or other of the TV channels after a series like Simon Schama’s. (I say ‘unfortunately’ because they are large books which made big print runs and quickly get priced down to £0.01 on Amazon.) What didn’t come into that category had frequently been gifted and inscribed to her by the author. As she talked she began to realise that she wasn’t ready to part with them quite yet so I came away with less than I had expected, which was fine by me. I was happy that she still had the anticipation of future pleasure re-reading them.
Two weeks ago I picked up books from a man whose wife died a couple of years back and who has now found a new lady to move in with in the north of England. He’s a handsome and intelligent man so it’s no surprise to anyone but him. He asked me out once and I felt churlish declining but his need for a life companion was evident and I just didn’t want the involvement. Quite soon after that he met a lady on a train and romance ensued so I was able to enjoy his happiness and cheer him on from the side-lines. He is humourously pleased with himself to be about to become a kept man (she’s younger than him and still working) and to ‘live in sin.’
People’s stories touch each other in a secondhand bookshop. There’s no place where the connectedness of human beings is more evident. Firstly the writers of the books themselves who fill these non-sentient objects with a spell that binds all who read them to the author for the time it takes to travel through the world he has created. Then past, present and future readers are bound together by the same spell as they physically touch and turn the pages touched and turned before, reading the same words. I remember - who doesn’t? - the composition title given as homework by a bored teacher, ‘A Day in the Life of a Penny.’ It could have been so much more interesting, though perhaps beyond the grasp of a ten year old, if it had been a year in the life of a book. The reasons they are chosen, the way they colour or even influence the lives they enter, must make a good tale.
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Re felting, the embellisher [about £200, but will get cheaper] felts anything soft wool, spun or just carded, woolly fabrics, felt whatever into anything else fairly loose woven. Remember the big lusty red woman I stitched wools and ribbons loosely into a dyed blanket, then embellished it in.. It sort of meshes it, creates a new fabic. Only problem is if I move the fabric too quickly and break a needle.
Mow that sounds brilliant. I loved working with the colours and would like to do something else. Maybe I'll start saving (I'll also need a bigger house.....)
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