I'm a huge fan of books. I love to read them, I love to smell them, and I love the way that they accumulate in front of the bookcases in my apartment because I have too many of them.
In line with my love for books, is the trip to the bookstore. Rows and rows of books towering overhead. The smell of old and new books mingling with the scent of coffee, and occasionally cigarettes. By going to a bookstore, I experience something that Amazon.com does not have: the chance to wander amongst the infinite offerings, touch them, preview them, and see what they have to offer. I can also talk with people that have recommendations, actually hearing and experiencing why they feel so passionate about a certain book. Through this process, I find exactly the book that I need. Or as I like to think, the book finds me.
Case in point. Friday night, my wife and I went to Cover to Cover Books in Downtown Vancouver, an independent bookstore that offers new and old books, the chance to talk with some incredible people, and a huge cat that is friendly. It is a glimpse at what bookstores used to be before corporations turned the bookstore into a mass-produced coffee-cafe-music-books-videos-magazine store catering to the person wanting to spend list price on everything. Anyway, I wandered the store, found what I wanted to buy, and as I perused the section about writing, a book stood out to me, "The Artist's Way" by Julia Cameron. In a nutshell, it is a book about creativity blocks that you, as an artist, could be struggling with and encourages you to be free in your pursuit of creativity. It was exactly the book that I needed, and it found me. As I go through it, I am re-inspired. I feel more alive. And it was worth every penny.
And without the experience of the local independent bookstore, I don't know if the book would have found me. I'll never know at this point, but I am grateful that it did.
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