BOOK/SHOP in the alley

This is a story about a book I found in an alley.  It's also got some booze, and dads, and poetry - so grab a chair and let me get you a drink.


I'd gone into the alley to get my hair cut.  I've done this before, and you can read about that here or here, but unlike those times, this time they were too busy for me.  After chalking my name on the board like I'd done in the past, one of the barbers looked at me, at my name there in white, and said, Nick?  You might want to come back in two hours.

Two hours?  Who waits two hours for a haircut?  Who comes back in two hours for a haircut?  Dejected, and not a little irritated, I took a slug of the whiskey that's always waiting there on a high shelf at the Temescal Alley Barbershop - this time they had an expensive bottle of Masterson's 10-Year-Old Straight Rye.

So I shot that and left.  Grumpy.  Smacking my lips, but grumpy.

But then - surprise! surprise! - I had an impromptu business meeting with Cheri, one of the amazing book reps that we in the Bay Area are so lucky to have.  These fellow troopers - aiding us while we fight our good fight, providing guidance and support as we in the trenches tirelessly strive to beat back the amazonian money grubbers - these delightful reps who ceaselessly help us get wonderful books into deserving hands.

That day we had donuts.

But after, right next door to the donuts, there was the BOOK/SHOP at the end of the alley.  We were coaxed inside by its charming, unpretentious sign - and inside, with its fresh white walls and white shelves, it felt like more like an art gallery than a used bookstore, a gem no larger than my backroom at ye olde bookshoppe on Park Street.

But unlike the art in a gallery, the books here beg to be touched and then bought.  Touched and bought and taken home where they can be read, and looked at, where you can set them on a shelf next to that silly photo of you from fourth grade, or where you can drop it next to your bed, dropped the night before when you fell asleep reading the amazing book you found that day in Oakland.

Space is precious at the BOOK/SHOP, so the few items they have for sale are elegantly displayed.  Books, yes, but - as Erik courteously explained after we asked - it's also a shop about books.  So books, yes, of course, but also prints and paintings and broadsides dealing directly with poets & novelists, writers of fact & fiction. . .

Perfume?  Sure, if it's in a bottle labelled In the Library.

Photo by Erik Heywood for BOOK/SHOP

Bookmarks?  Naturally, but bookmarks that are more slim pieces of art than anything else.  Or how about a small tub of the paper-and-book cleaner made by Absorene since 1891?  Yeah, they have that.

But the books?  Oh, the beautiful books.  Because BOOK/SHOP is modest in size, their inventory changes quickly.  Week to week, we were warned, you might find yourself in the same BOOK/SHOP but stocked with entirely different books.

And again, those beautiful books.  I was especially taken by a first edition of Nobel laureate Gunter Grass' novel, Cat and Mouse.  It's book #2 in his Danzig Trilogy, the trilogy that began in 1959 with The Tin Drum and ended with Dog Years in 1963.

Photo by Valeda Stull for BOOK/SHOP

Even though the spine of Cat and Mouse was sun-faded, this copy was a charmer because of the inscription.  I often steer clear of books that have been marred by book plates or scribbled names - just one more example of people pissing on their things to mark territory.  So I usually don't go in for that kind of thing - unless I do.  Unless it's something written by the author, say - or unless the inscription is particularly beguiling.

This inscription was just that.  It was written in blue ink by a Father to his Son on the occasion of the Son's birthday.  Father quoted Thoreau, then quipped something ridiculous, and then - but then - Father signed off with:


Yours in sobriety....
Dad


And there's an entire novel there, right?  A novel hidden in plain sight on a flyleaf?

I should have purchased the book - but I had excuses.  Sun-faded, remember?

-or-

It's just after the holidays and I shouldn't be treating myself to baubles, no matter how pretty.

-or-

Under the inscription, a later owner had signed his name in bold black ink, and I've mentioned before how I feel about the piss-markings inside books, yes?

So I didn't buy the book, but I told its story to a number of different friends, and the more I told the story the more I wanted to own the book--


Yours in sobriety....
Dad


--because that inscription was so rich in a shared history.  Father to Son.  Reader to reader.  Heck, maybe the signed name at the bottom of the page was the Son.  What if it wasn't inked there by a later owner but by the recipient himself?

I went back to the alley a week later, on Friday.  First to get my haircut.  Second, to take another shot of the Masterson's on my way out of the barbershop to buck up because I was worried - worried Cat and Mouse would be gone because we'd been warned that the stock changed quickly, worried that it had been purchased by someone smarter, someone better at taking notes.

Like I'd been told, the store's interior had changed radically from my first visit - and Cat and Mouse was gone.  The shelf where I'd seen it the Friday previously was taken by a manual of decorated typefaces.

So I spritzed the inside of my wrist with the Library perfume as consolation and was about to leave when I saw it - someone had been perusing Cat and Mouse and then had left it on the reading chair when they had gone.

I picked it up and read the inscription again.


My son:

Thoreau says:  "I was rich, if not in money, in sunny hours and summer days."

I say:    "It's not hee-hee or ho-ho
             To sit next a burping dodo."

Yours in sobriety and in happy birthdaying you.

Dad.


You've come back, Erik said, smiling.

I did, I said.  I saw this last week and you told me to buy it then, but I didn't.

Did you know it's from the personal library of Douglas Blazek? Erik said.

I had no idea who Blazek was but I could feel a vista about to be revealed as Erik took Cat and Mouse from my hand and pointed to that black signature under the inscription.

He was a contemporary of the Beats, Erik said.  A published poet who also published others.  Blazek brought attention to writers like Bukowski - and here, Erik's voice grew stronger, not quite like a preacher who's found a willing congregant, but awfully close.

Let me show you, Erik said, and he handed Cat and Mouse back to me and went to the small stack of books and pamphlets that seemingly had just come into the shop, that hadn't yet been placed in the perfect light to showcase their beauty.

He carefully removed a copy of Charles Bukowski's poems written before jumping out of an 8 story window from its protective sleeve.  Here, Erik said, and he showed me the dedication.

It's funny, I said, that you have so few books but that you have both these books here at the same time - speaking to each other.

I asked if I could see the copy of the Bukowski collection.  It was in the format of the hundreds of 8x8 kids books that we have in the store.  A few dozen pages - bound flat, without a spine.  But this was no book you'd hand to a first-grader, not a Little Golden Book to read with grandma.

It appears that certain people, Bukowski writes by way of introduction, think that poetry should be a certain way.  For these, there will be nothing but troubled years.  More and more people will come along to break their concepts.  It's hard I know, like having somebody fuck your wife while you are at work, but life, as they say, goes on.

Oh my, Mr. Bukowski.  Oh my.

When was this published? I said, and Erik picked up the phone and made a call.  The Bukowski collection was too expensive to buy, but the serendipity of it being here after I came for the other - of Blazek owning the one and being mentioned in this...

1968, Erik said.  It's a beautiful copy, isn't it?

Cat and Mouse, I said.  Was the inscription to Blazek?  Was it his birthday?

I don't think so, Erik said.  I think Blazek came into possession of the book later.

Ok, I said.

Ok? Erik said.

Both, I said.  I'd like both.


Cat and Mouse had to have belonged to Blazek, right?  Had to.  It'd make this all so much better if - before Blazek became the publisher of Bukowski, before poems written before jumping out of an 8 story window had been dedicated to him - if before all that he had been

My son

Better story right there.

Sitting in my car, I notice a part of the inscription I hadn't before - Father had dated it, in the smallest print possible - upper right corner - 12/31/63.

And Blazek had signed his name, followed by 1963 - had to have been a gift to him, yes? 

If Blazek's birthday was New Year's Eve, that'd seal the deal.  I should have called a reference librarian instead of booting up Wiki, but do reference librarians even answer those questions anymore?

Wiki told me Blazek was born in 1941, but not the day.  Who does that?  Include an entry with a birth year but not birth date?  Couldn't they have checked Wikipedia?

I dug around a little bit more until I stumbled across a blog, Writing the Polish Diaspora (who knew?), and in this post, I discovered a certain shiny nugget about Blazek's upbringing: 

I was born in St. Elizabeth’s Hospital, Chicago’s west side, on the last day of 1941.

Bingo, right?  Bingo.

So here I am with this great copy of Cat and Mouse by Gunter Grass, about the craziness of growing up in Poland after the war, dealing with that long shadow - and it was owned by Douglas Blazek, given to him by his father on his 23rd birthday, just before Blazek would write his own books, just before Blazek would be part of an important poetry underground that would end up lifting all letters high.

All because I walked down an alley into a BOOK/SHOP.  You should, too.  As their card says, it's not just a shop selling books, but a shop devoted to them in all kinds of ways.

Where you're bound to stumble across a little bit of history that's going to resonate.

Go shop at a real store - go get your hands on a beautifully made book - read an inscription from an earlier time - imagine its history - revel in that, and the book - and then go back for more.

Only, if you do, promise you'll tell me about it.

Bryant

Karen reminded me this morning that Elizabeth was three when she started at Dance/10.

Elizabeth was unsure, there at the beginning, how comfortable she felt having to shake her little booty in front of a lot of strangers - even if those strangers were primarily other three-year-old girls.  Everyone at the studio, though, was encouraging - though none was as warm and vibrant as Bryant.

Bryant taught Hip Hop and one of his classes ended at the same time as Elizabeth's.  Elizabeth would stand at the bottom of the stairs, after her class, and watch the older teens hippity-hop.  I don't know who was having more fun - the rapturous dancers, following the lead of Bryant, or Elizabeth.  Elizabeth, grooving her little body to the tunes Bryant had chosen.

Early on, Bryant saw Elizabeth off to the side - watching.  When his class ended, he glided over and dropped to his knees.  Hey, girl, he said.  You look like you want to join my class!

If people could fly, Elizabeth would've flown.  Such was the power behind Bryant's smile, accompanied by his willingness to take a moment in the craziness of pickup - with multiple dance classes letting out - to stop and give encouragement to a shy little girl who didn't know exactly what she wanted to do, not yet, but that maybe it had something to do with what she saw this man just do.

Bryant?  I never saw Bryant without a smile.  Bryant walked around each day like he'd just won the lottery - and he wasn't going to tell you about it, but he'd show you what it meant to feel so good about the world that maybe you, too, might pass some of that good will on to those around you.

Happy?  That man defined happy with his grace and effortless moves - in the studio and on the stage.  I'm sorry I didn't know him outside Dance/10 - I'm pretty sure he was as joyful outside it as in.

If you were lucky enough to ever see Bryant leap?  Ever see him jump?  You saw the world jump, joyful.


Bryant Cash-Welch passed away early this morning of a heart attack.  I don't know any more than that.  I do know that the music softened everywhere because of his passing.  Bryant - you will be missed by all those you touched in word, deed and dance.  Thank you for having a kind smile for Elizabeth and Kristina and for bringing joy into their lives.  Into all our lives.  Thank you so much.

Thank you.

Happy New Year with a Hangar Banger!

This was concocted for an event on January 19th at The Chapel in San Francisco with Armistead Maupin to commemorate the publication of his final tale in his Tales of the City.

The Harvey Wallbanger is probably the most '70's of all '70's drinks, so I went with that and tarted it up just a bit.

More on the event later, but for now, Cheers!

Hangar Banger:

1.5 oz. Hangar One Mandarin Blossom Vodka

4 oz. fresh orange juice

.5 oz. Galliano

Stir vodka and orange juice in a tall, chilled glass.  Add ice.  Float the Galliano on top.  Garnish with an orange wedge.

Ghosts of Christmas Past

Last night - with the wine in crystal goblets glistening in the light of the green candles running the length of our Christmas table - we remembered those who couldn't be with us.  Like my dad.  My dad and his brothers.

I was a pallbearer this year in Salt Lake City for both of those brothers, my uncles.  Two men I loved, the last direct link to my father.  The last people who could answer the questions I still have about their childhood, about growing up in the coal-mining town of Hiawatha, Utah.

Salt Lake City was beautiful both times I flew there in 2013.  Beautiful but sad.  First in early May, then in October.  And now it's already Christmas - the year nearly over.

This time of year always finds the picture rails in our front room lined with holiday cards.  One of the first we received was the Christmas card from my Aunt Ursula.  Aunt Ursula whose husband, my Uncle Pete, died in April.  Inside the card:


Dear Family Petrulakis, she wrote.

I hope all your wishes come true, she wrote.  Have a happy and healthy New Year.

She continued, of course.  How could she not?

I am missing Pete something awful, she wrote.

We spent 45 years together on Christmas, she wrote.

I put the Christmas decorations up just like he liked them, she wrote.

May his memory be eternal.

Love you all.  Ursula.

Tony in front, Dean behind him, then Pete.
Circa 1944

And the enormity of her loss almost became plain.  I knew at the funeral how much she missed her husband, my uncle.  At the next funeral, for my Uncle Dean, Ursula was beautiful in black, and missing her husband, my uncle, something awful.

So - on one very superficial level - I understood how much Aunt Ursula must miss her husband, my uncle.  The same way I know how much my mom misses my dad.  How much Judy misses her partner, my Uncle Dean.

But I still don't really understand, right?  The degree of the loss?  Of spending 45 Christmases with someone, and then not?

The love that leads you to decorate your home with Christmas decorations because he - her husband, my uncle - loved it so?


When my mom walked into our house yesterday, the first thing she saw was the grand rocking horse she bought my Elizabeth for her first Christmas in 2004.  My mom stopped short, looking at our mantle, at the horse there, and then turned, her eyes already wet.

Is that...? she said.

She'd never seen it displayed before.  The last time she saw it was when we opened it at our house, the largest package under our tree that year.  I hadn't put it out before because - though beautiful - it's full of sharp angles and so heavy that little toes under the horse's treads could be hurt so easy.  Then a few years later Kristina came along so we continued to not display the horse because of our caution, our worry.

The rocking horse stayed in its box, in our garage, Christmas after Christmas.  Until this year when we were again hosting my family on Christmas Eve and I thought, even though we'd have two visitors even more little than our own - thanks to my brother Dean and his wife, Laura - maybe I could finally display the rocking horse if I put it up high, on our mantle.

Is that...? my mom said.

It is, I said.

And with her eyes getting more wet my mom said she remembered seeing that rocking horse on display at Keller's in Modesto.  It was too dear, though, too expensive to pick up on a whim for her first grandchild.

When my dad came home from work that night she told him about the rocking horse, the rocking horse that played Silver Bells, and he asked where it was.

Oh, Andoni, she began, ready to explain why she hadn't bought it that afternoon.  But before she could get past the words, Oh, Andoni - my dad interrupted.

Anna, he said, smiling.  Just go get it for her.

My dad who had so much love for my mom.  Who adored her so much.  Who had realized so quickly how much he loved our Elizabeth.  Elizabeth named for his mom, my YiaYia.

Anna, he said, smiling.  Just go get it for her.


As we sat around the table last night, remembering those who are no longer with us, we realized, Karen and I realized, that the rocking horse would be on display every Christmas from now on.

Just like he liked them, Aunt Ursula wrote.  Just like he liked them.

Merry Christmas to everyone near and far - and to those who aren't with us.  Set out a plate, or a glass, and remember how they liked it.  How much they liked it.

Merry Christmas.

Kermit Lynch at the Chapel, today at 2pm

And then sometimes you get thrown a fat one right over the plate.  Gotta swing, right?  Gotta swing.


Today at two, Books Inc. presents Kermit Lynch in conversation with Rajat Parr.  Kermit Lynch, purveyor of fine wine, importer, wine maker, author - just so happens to divide his time between Berkeley and France - so those of us in the bay area are fortunate to have him so close, so often.

Have you been to his shop, Kermit Lynch Wine Merchant, on San Pablo in Berkeley?  It's just ridiculously wonderful to have someone with such exceptional taste so near.  I will admit that I am not an oenophile - if the definition of the word is a connoisseur.  If, though, you define it as someone who's simply a lover of wine, then I'm your guy.  I used to be a slave to the ratings-cards that wine shops provide - 87 points!  I used to be in.

Now, though, I talk to the people behind the counter.  That's what we do at ye olde bookshoppe, right?  If you have a question, I can answer it.  Same with wine.  Good shops employ knowledgeable people, and Kermit Lynch Wine Merchant is full of good people with great advice.

So there's the fact that Mr. Lynch is a recognized and influential wine expert - as this piece in the New York Times wonderfully demonstrates.  Then there's the book.  When Adventures on the Wine Route came out in 1988, critics as diverse as Roald Dahl, Hugh Johnson and the Financial Times praised it mightily.

It's idiosyncratic, funny, informative.  A wee bit different than the stodgy wine writing you might be used to.

Adventures on the Wine Route is a great pleasure to read.

It’s this idea of pleasure, I think, that separates Mr. Lynch’s book from the others, and that also illumines his taste in wine.  Wine is, he writes, above all, pleasure.  

What’s he a fan of?  Good wine.  He’s not a fan of filtration – which, though it makes more wine safe from spoiling, also makes it impossible to achieve the heights unfiltered wines can achieve.  We would not castrate all men, he writes, because some of them go haywire and commit rape.

Thank god for that.

But today - the event at the Chapel.  Not only is it Kermit Lynch, he's going to be in conversation with Rajat Parr, wine director for the Mina Group

At Parr’s restaurants - like Michael Mina - he says his concern is with showcasing the wine itself – not necessarily its reputation, but what’s in the bottle.  He says to taste with your heart, not your mind – which might give you a clue as to why they get on so well.

He also is the author of Secrets of the Sommeliers – bestseller and winner of a James Beard Cookbook Award.

Plus, he loves PDT, a speakeasy in New York which is one of my favorite bars, ever – in addition to his own Clock Bar here in the city, meaning you don’t have to travel 3,000 miles to get there.

Both men would agree that the great occasions of our life are celebrated with food and wine.  So, today, a celebration of an amazing author, a terrific book – and great wine.

Oh, and that fat one that was thrown over my plate?  It was the request to introduce both men at the Chapel - something I will gladly do.  Here's me, then, swinging away.

Join us if you can.

Introducing the Jenny Bonnet - Jenny to you.

One of the perks you get as a bookseller is being able to peek at books before they're published - we sometimes see these advance copies so that we're good and ready to tell you about them when they do come out.  Such is the case with Emma Donoghue's Frog Music.

You'll know Ms. Donoghue from her previous writing including her last novel, the bestselling Room - that desperate, claustrophobic and brilliant story about the ends one mother goes to in an attempt to shelter her son from their unthinkable crisis of circumstance.  Have you not read Room?  Go, ok?  Just go do that.

As is her wont, she has jumped from the contemporary to the historical in Frog Music.  It's the United States' Centennial and brash and dynamic San Francisco is where Blanche Beunon will be run over - literally - by Jenny Bonnet, a frog hunting, oft-arrested (for appearing in the apparel of the opposite sex), bicycle stealing twenty-seven-year-old who will spirit into your consciousness even quicker than she can snatch frogs.

More's the pity that Jenny is shotgunned on page three.  Leave it to Ms. Donoghue to introduce a woman you'll fall in love with as soon as she sings a lullaby to Blanche - leaving the rest of the novel to show how they met and why they ended up ambushed at Eight Mile House.

But all that's for next year - April of 2014 when Frog Music hits our shelves.  In the meantime, I'd like you to enjoy a drink inspired by Jenny.  I started with genever - gin before there was gin - because, yes, alliteration, but also because it's something Jenny and Blanche might've shared at the Pony Express Saloon.  It'll keep you warm through the winter - until spring when you can meet Jenny for yourself.

Another perk booksellers sometimes receive is breaking bread with authors during pre-publication tours.  I'm lucky enough to meet Ms. Donoghue tonight in San Francisco - and though we may not get to sample a Jenny, we will be able to talk about the real life Jenny Bonnet who inspired Frog Music.

The Jenny Bonnet:

 2 oz. Bols Genever
.75 oz. simple syrup
.75 oz. fresh lemon juice
.5 oz. Luxardo Maraschino Liqueur
2 drops Cherry Bark Vanilla Bitters

Combine all - except bitters - and stir with ice.  Strain into chilled glass.  Add bitters & garnish with maraschino cherry.

Mrs. Poe

First there came the book, and the book was Mrs. Poe by Lynn Cullen.  I was seduced by the novel because it gleamed like a diamond in gaslight, its facets glittering.  Look, there's a love story.  Over here, a tale of 19th century Boston and New York with their cobbled streets and sinister corners.  And sparking over it all, Edgar Allan Poe.  So part masterful biography, too.

But always glinting, first here, then there - the two woman that would complete Poe's triangle.  Their love story wasn't innocent, of course.  Is seduction ever innocent?  And who - there at the beginning - was I supposed to like more?  Mrs. Poe, the frail and dying wife of the poet?  Or Frances Osgood, a writer herself, laboring to support her children after her husband left her for a brighter bauble?

So the book came first.  Then came the dinner.

Booksellers are sometimes treated to pre-publication parties in celebration of an author or authors.  This dinner took place in July and Ms. Cullen was one of the authors being feted.

The gatherings are almost always a delight and this was no exception.  The hope is that you meet the author - putting the proverbial face to a name - but also, just maybe, something more.  Something that sometimes happens when you're able to talk to an author over bread and wine - about the book and how it came to be or about some interesting morsel that dropped to the floor but that's still illuminating.

I'm lucky to sometimes be included in those gatherings.  On that San Francisco night, we talked books and booze and writing.

The drink came next.

I have a bit of a thing for Poe -  and for cocktails - and so there was some mingled talk that night about both.  I was delighted, then, when I was asked by Ms. Cullen to create a drink for the book.  Mrs. Poe had been chosen by Book Movement to be their Book of the Month for October.  Book Movement is a great resource for book clubs and they requested food and drink suggestions to accompany the discussions the book would generate.

If the drink had been called Edgar, absinthe may have played a role, but for Mrs. Poe it seemed something lighter was in order.  Although, even when good cocktails taste that way, they're never really light.

Mrs. Poe would begin with St. Germain, a wonderful liqueur that's light and aromatic, made from frail elderflowers.  Perfect for her.

Maybe that and a little gin - I said cocktails are never light, right?  Some Benedictine, too, because that's something that Poe - Mr. and Mrs. - could have sipped in their New York, and I wanted to include something contemporaneous.

After some mixing and matching, Mrs. Poe became:


1.5 oz. Hendrick's Gin
.25. oz. St. Germain
1 barspoon Benedictine
1 dash Peychaud's bitters

Stir all with ice. Strain into chilled cocktail glass. Garnish with lemon twist.


Then we decided (this had become a collaboration and Lynn is as much the author of these drinks as she is of Mrs. Poe) some punches would be fun, too - since punches were all the rage in New York society in the 1840's.  Like, for example: 

Mrs. Poe's Punch:

  

2 cups apple juice, chilled
Juice of 8 lemons, about 1.5 cups
1 cup sugar
Fresh mint
1 or 2 bottles champagne, chilled
Frozen raspberries

Lightly muddle mint leaves with apple juice and sugar.  Add lemon juice and stir until sugar dissolves.  Chill until it's time to talk about Mrs. Poe.  Pour into punch bowl.  Add champagne to taste.  Garnish with frozen raspberries and mint.

As you can imagine, this was a joy for me.  Here I was, mixing two of my passions.  Terrific, yes? 

And that would have been enough, but then the wonderful people at Gallery Books (hello Stephanie DeLuca and Simon and Schuster) created a terrific broadside with the recipes for the punches and the cocktail. 

I've been called a number of things in my time, but never a mixologist, and yet there it was - in print - so it had to be true, right? 

So we made some drinks, and others have now made some drinks, and the drinks are good but the book?  The book's marvelous. 

For me, a favor?  Please purchase Mrs. Poe - I'd prefer that you bought it from your favorite indie bookseller, but what I really want is for you to own it, to read it.  So get it.  And if you have time, stop by ye olde bookshoppe tonight because Lynn Cullen will be there and we'll be talking Mrs. Poe and sipping more of those drinks. 

Stop by, yes?  I'll save a seat for you.