The Path of the Bookseller

It snowed inside our store a few days ago. Yes, inside.

There’s a skylight above the center of the store. One of the glass panels in it is just loose enough that when snow had piled up on it for several minutes, it would push down and let a flurry drift down onto a display table. One of my coworkers paged a manager to come see it. They agreed that it was quite beautiful, but had to move the table because the books were getting wet.

It’s not just cold, here in Cleveland, it’s frakking cold. Weather Underground predicted that the temperature would go down to -3 degrees tonight. That’s Fahrenheit. You could probably measure it in Centigrade by letting a centipede loose and seeing how far it would get before it turned into a bugsicle.

I was pleased that I was actually able to get my mail out of my mailbox today, since there was some critical stuff in there. A few days back, I procrastinated long enough that, with the temperatures sneaking up just above freezing for a while, the snow atop the box thawed a little, drained into the mailbox, then froze again into a solid block of ice. When I tried to thaw the ice by pouring hot water on it, it only melted a little of it, and got the mail soggy. I came upstairs bearing half a magazine (the left side, with the binding, the right side remaining firmly within the ice’s grip.)

Even the hardiest Clevelanders are leery of heading out in this weather. The store is close to empty of customers, but we’re getting a lot more calls and online reserves, since people want to be sure that we actually have what they want before venturing forth.

I’m dressing for the weather. When I go out, I wear gloves, a heavy coat, a wool hat, a hood, and a soft, camouflage colored facemask that makes me look a bit like Hannibal Lecter.

Today was my day off. I went grocery shopping. The walk to the store was tolerable, though once inside, I had to wait a little while before I could stop shivering and think somewhat coherently. Coffee helped. Most of the sidewalks were hopeless for walking, piled with snow, often with a layer of ice beneath it. Walking in the street was better, but too dangerous on the main road. My iPod helped keep my mind off the cold: I’m listening to the audiobook of Barack Obama’s Dreams From My Father, which is even better than I had hoped.

The walk was faintly hallucinatory. When I exhale wearing the facemask, it directs my breath upwards. In less frigid weather, my glasses fog a little. In this cold, the breath freezes immediately, forming a crystalline sheen on my glasses and causing rainbow halos around any lights that I see. Very beautiful. Very trippy.

I’m working again tomorrow morning, out before dawn to walk (or slide) for ten minutes or so before waiting at the bus stop for an indeterminate amount of time, depending on just how poorly our sparsely scheduled bus line is conforming to its supposed times. (If we carried the bus schedules, they would be shelved on the endcap near where Local Interest, Fantasy, and Horror meet.)

But now to go to bed, donning a couple of sweatshirts, crawling under all the blankets on my air mattress, and trying to sleep. If visions of sugar plums dance in my head, I may have to use them for target practice.