Couldn’t Find a Certain Place
But I sure found a treasure trove.
I decided to go on a trip to look for yard sales after work. One of my friends suggested I try to find this place a little ways away where they sold a lot of amazing finds at a Church. So I jumped in my car after work, drove off into the distance and least to say I could not find it.
As I was still searching with no such luck (or they closed and I couldn’t recognize it due to the rain), I passed by a sign with a tall pink building. It caught my eye instantly and read “Rare and Old Books”. I’ve never driven through that location so I stopped to check it out. I saw a note posted on the wall about not letting the cat out and I could tell this was a local place which made me much more happy. Yet as I stepped into this bright pink home, I was met with the smell of old books. All around me were books of different sizes, shapes, and colors filling different types of old book cases, hand made ones, and crates. As soon as I had walked in, I began looking through them.
Some of the books went back to even the 16th century. There were leather bound books all over, hand-made books with printed type text. I was amazed and excited. This place didn’t look that big when you first see it but then you find out there are three levels of books! From the basement to the second floor, you are in a tightly closed place surrounded by books some as recent as this year but for the most part are from over 50 years ago. I began looking through this mass of books, hoping to find at least one piece I could go home with since I knew it would take much longer for me to look more thoroughly than I had time to do so. I asked about poetry and philosophy and was overwhelmed by what they had. Sadly some of the categories were mixed in with different genres like many authors were in different sections throughout the place but when it’s a local store and you have such a massive collection well no wonder!
Not being able to decide, I finally decided to just look for one certain author who I knew I’d be interested in, “Thoreau”. I had already seen a first edition of his “Cape Cod” but I never really liked that book. I also found a Leather Bound copy of his “Walden” but didn’t like the fact that it was in red and part of a series collection of 100 books. I was directed to a small little pile in the corner of the store and was told to help myself. I saw many different styles of books from recent ones to ones that were in the early 1900s. I found a small hardcover book of Walden that was green which had no print source but sold for 4.50. A keeper (regardless of the fact that I already have a copy). Then, I noticed a small little box with very faded gold print. The outside cover of the book had a very flimsy and tattered wear to it, so I pulled it out gently. At first, all I could read was “The Moon” which I thought might have been a different book that was mixed into the pile (since I saw a few books mixed in as well). But no, it was by Thoreau and was printed in 1918. It had pressed in type, hand made paper, and was very fragile. Apparently for that period, it wasn’t too uncommon to have the tops of pages stuck together but it still could be read easily. For its age, it was taken really well care of.
Then I looked at the price. 60 dollars. I had never spent more than 25 dollars on a book I personally bought for myself (which just so happened to be my first book from Thoreau, “Walden”), and even though I was a little deterred, I still found myself desiring the book so I decided to read through the beginning a little bit. I found out a little about the history, about how the notes from pages he was making before he had time to publish them due to his death were most likely for speeches and lectures. “The Moon” was an annotation for a couple of notes he had when found after his death. This was his work. I also found that there were only 500 books printed in this fashion. And when I read the first paragraph, I knew I had to have it.
I’m going back to that place. I never did find the church but I found something so much more amazing. It just goes to show that sometimes, when the things you try to look for don’t show up, there may be something even more amazing around the corner.
