Another day, another dollar...

There is a quote in The Writing Life by Annie Dillard that I have always remembered for times like these:

"Another day, another dollar, fifteen hours on snowshoes and I wish I had pie."
--a diary entry from a Maine tracker

I can relate to this. More so now than ever before. I could really use a slice of pie. Or peach cobbler. Mmmm.

It is a trying time in the pursuit of a book store. The process of acquiring funds, particularly for a project of this scale is daunting. I think that in any quest for financing, be it for a super sized Indy book store or a bag of peanuts on a street corner in New York, there has to be a measure of creativity somewhere betwixt the dream and reality. It isn't imagination per se, but unfathomable gall. You have to believe in your idea--truly so--to the degree that people are infected by it simply by standing in your presence. You radiate the passion and people perk up and listen. My youngest sister told me that she knew I would get the store that I desired because I could see it so clearly in my head that I could walk through the store and describe everything to her. When it becomes that real, I suppose you more or less become the idea. I am Wordsmiths Books, yes?

I find that I am.

So as not to bore you entirely with the minutia of financing--it is such a lovely topic, isn't it?--I offer you a couple of pictures from our event with Thomas Laird.

He was a tremendously nice guy and quite obviously intelligent. It's refreshing to meet authors who make you actually want to read their work. The Story of Tibet is now on my list of must reads.



I am now on to You Suck: A Love Story by the incomparable Christopher Moore. If you haven't read his work...well, you should, right? That's my sales pitch. That's it. Just, you should because I said so. Isn't that enough?

That's it for tonight. From what I understand, the blog will become part of our website in the next couple of days, so if all goes well then I'll see you back home, where I'll be curled up on some hammock of a back page with a book in my lap, my eyes tight and sounding a snore that shakes the earth itself. See you there.

--zach