I read most things in an electronic format now - Kindle ebooks, Texture magazine subscription, National Review Online for conservative commentary, news sites on the web to keep up. But I still love book stores.
I have a lot of good memories involving book stores. Growing up my family lived 30 minutes outside of the town we were near. Occassionaly on the weekends we would go into town and go to a book store to get something new to read. I would buy another Peanuts/Charlie Brown paperbook and a new Star Trek book while my mother would buy a couple of new mysteries to read. Dad didnâ?Tt read for pleasure then. My brother was hooked on comic books so he would get the latest Hulk, Batman, or whatever.
When the mall was built we would go to the book store there. Just as much fun but so much more to see. I enjoyed the smell of the pages, all the colors and sizes of the different books. Picking the book I wanted to read was so difficult because I knew we wouldnâ?Tt be back for a few weeks, so I would take forever to decide which books to get.
Mom worked at the library for a while. I enjoyed going there but it was always disappointing when I had to take the book back. And they were covered in plastic so I couldnâ?Tt actually touch the book. Weird.
Mom taught me to respect books. Never to break the back by folding it over so it could be held in one hand. Never to dog-ear the pages to mark where I was. I took pleasure in folding a blank piece of notebook paper in half width-wise, then folding it half again, then one more time to make a bookmark. I tried to use a new piece of paper for each book and then leave them in the book so Iâ?Td have it when I read the book again. Eventually the bookmarks took on the smell of the pages, which I thought was cool.
My mother also taught me that if I kept a book with me at all times Iâ?Td never be bored. So Iâ?Td carry a paperback book with me everywhere I could. Riding in the car Iâ?Td have my nose in the book and escape to wherever the book was set. It was wonderful.
Ebooks revolutionized my reading efforts. I didnâ?Tt think a dedicated device made sense so I resisted the early Kindles but I used the heck out of ebook apps. Fictionwise was my first favorite site to buy books on, though I wished that they cost less because I wasnâ?Tt getting a physical copy of the book. Barnes & Noble was one of my favorite stores so I used their Nook reader and loved when Fictionwise was bought by them. I started buying ebooks from Amazon and loved their Kindle app, which Iâ?Tve used on every smart phone Iâ?Tve owned as well as on my iPod Touch and iPads. I finally bought a Kindle to use at bedtime and have enjoyed the Paperwhite Kindles as they have gotten thinner and waterproof. And with ebooks I carry a whole library of books with me wherever I go so I am never bored.
We tried to teach our children to love bookstores, too. On Friday nights weâ?Td go to the local Books-a-Million and let them play with the trains in the childrenâ?Ts section while we browsed. Weâ?Td encourage them to get into series of books and buy them one every few weeks. It was fun!
And as book stores have changed Iâ?Tve enjoyed the changes even when they didnâ?Tt make sense. The coffee, the games, the puzzles and brain teasers, all were fun additions to our book store adventures. But I still love the smell of book stores. Amazon is awesome but the experience of buying ebooks just doesnâ?Tt compare to a physical book store.
Iâ?Tve got some great memories from the book stores Iâ?Tve been to. Wonderful!
