cellini's Diaryland Diary

-----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

My bookstore is doing ok and I am dating my wife

Today the bookstore hit a milestone -- the single most expensive book ever sold.

It was a signed M0dern Library edition of J0an Didion's "Slouching Towards Bethlehem." I sold it to the great novelist, D0nna Tart for $500. Last night I researched it, figuring out what to price it at, and I found that the least expensive signed copy of that book in any edition was going for $1,600. The hell I'm going to price it that high, when I paid about $2 for it, so I called it $500 and shelved it.

Donna is a regular and picked it right up, along with something off of our dollar shelf. We had our record highest revenue for a Tuesday, at $1,025. Tuesdays are normally the lowest day for sales. Less than 24 hours from noticing it to selling it.

I was thinking today that the business model for the store has changed. We provide both products and a service. We sell used books, and we provide the service of removing books from houses. No other book dealer in this region will make house calls and take everything. That is where about 70% of our inventory for the last few months has come from. The word is out that we make house calls. Mostly baby boomers in one of the following situations: Someone has died; they are downsizing before moving to a condo or to a retirement home, or they are doing death cleaning. That is accepting that they are really old and getting stuff out of the house on their own terms so that their kids or grandkids don't have to deal with all of it.

I am the guy who will show up on time and get all of the books out of the house before the closing ten days from now. And I will write you a check adequate to go out to your favorite restaurant and order whatever you want. And now you don't have to worry about getting 3,000 books out of your house and I will find people for your books who care about them, so you don't have to worry about them ending up at Goodwill or the dump.

It turns out that a lot of those books are really valuable. I'm working my ass off and driving a lot while paying $1 each for signed Norman Mailers, over a hundred signed first edition Paul Th3rouxs, first edition John Steinbecks, and all of the books that the wealthiest of my parents' generation spent a lifetime accumulating.

I have probably a few dozen individual books priced at $500 or more and this is the first of them to sell. Kind of a big deal for me.

We're at a weird point. D@edalus was known for being a sort of rag and bone shop, selling used books for a few bucks. The previous owner didn't know how to use the internet. He knew a lot about books, but he didn't know about rare books and had no idea how identify them, how to price them or display them or sell them. And this place was still famous, ending up in a book on America's fifty best used book shops.

I've spent the last six months doing carpentry, building new bookcases tilted out for the bottom four or five shelves, culling shitty books, buying these exceptional collections, having my employees organize and clean. We got the Ke@ts death mask. We have the M3mories of Strangers machine, We have hundreds of rare and collectible books priced at 10 to 60% lower than the lowest price offered anywhere in the world online. With thousands more piled up in boxes in my office waiting for me to have time to research and price them. I think that we should now be on any top ten list of the best used b00k stores in America.

We have a Camus author section loaded with first English language editions. We have six shelves full of Modern Library firsts with dust jackets. We have thousands of signed books for less than ten bucks. We ladle out free gumbo on random Sundays. The Beta Band, The Cure, Kate Bush and The The are all on heavy rotation. This is the most sincere used book store in the US. We are the shit. We're just waiting for the world to notice that we aren't a rag and bone shop anymore and we're ready for prime time.

I bought tickets to an outdoor opera at an old quarry for Thursday. Over a hundred bucks. I could give a fuck about opera, honestly, but I did it and am bringing Trish because she loves opera.

Dating is really expensive. Trish is now my single largest weekly expense. I spend about $400 a week on her, which is not including rare books that I gift her. Restaurants, mostly. Now opera tickets.

I don't know what she makes of that. Does she realize what this adds up to? Does she know that I am literally spending half of my income on being with her? Right after spending some thousands of dollars on Ida's wedding?

All I really want is an evening with her, at her place, on the couch, cuddling and watching whatever movie she wants. I just want her in my arms for a few hours while literally anything happens on a screen.

I just want to go home. She is home. I know that I am out of her league. I know that she is a random, middle-aged woman working a temp job at a library with no prospects. But I have this chance. This incredibly rare chance. I committed to her when I was 17 years old and I want to be true to that commitment. Thirteen or so years after she left she is trying to come back.

I want the picnic for Thursday to be perfect. I want the perfect blanket and the perfect bottle of champagne for the opera and the perfect picnic ready. I just want to do everything right. Forever. I want the opportunity to do everything right, To bring the flowers and listen to how her day was and fix her car and encourage her to audition for a play and give her a back rub and watch Antiques Roadshow in bed and go down on her.

I am so ready to do all of the things right. Again and again, for as long as I live. I will never fuck up again, I promise. I will never take a woman I love for granted. I will bring Trish fully into my life, introducing her to the Ch1nchilla Cafe, I will take her fishing and crabbing to whatever extent that she wants to come along. I will be the perfect boyfriend and husband, week after week, month after month, year after year. I will be her perfect boyfriend, even after I am her husband again. I will love and cherish her for the rest of my life. I will be as patient as I need to be during our journey towards physical intimacy together. Which means that I will wait as long as she needs (within reason) until she is ready to fuck again.

That is going to be a big fucking deal. The moment that I penetrate her again with my cock.

Normally that would be a third or fourth date thing. In this case it is going to be slow and whenever she is ready. I love her so much. That's not easy to get to.

Our first date was her inviting me over to her place and having her way with me. A few times later, I had my first orgasm inside of her. This strange sensation. An itch that I could not scratch. This glow inside of me. And it grew and grew and I literally did not know what it was until it exploded inside of her.

There is no way to be cool and casual about dating the woman you spent 17 years with and will never, ever, be over. There is no play book for this at all, I'm just doing everything that I can think of to make her happy and hoping that she notices that I am doing it.

2:04 a.m. - 2024-06-05

-----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

previous - next

latest entry

about me

archives

notes

DiaryLand

contact

random entry

other diaries:

metonym
mnemosynea
pipersplace
jendix

0 comments so far