gaspard et lisa

I enjoy trying to figure out where the customers are from as they come downstairs. Some obviously don't speak right away but within entering the room they usually say a few words. Some of them address me directly, ruling out whether they are French or not right away. The Italians and the Spanish generally don't try to speak French much past Bonjour so they're pretty easy. Portuguese, too, except whether they're Brazilian or not is more difficult. Americans I spot a mile away but the other anglophones take a bit more time to pick out. Got to get them talking. Accents I love are Irish, Spanish and French speaking English. I also enjoy the Japanese because they're so different from any other people I've met. I love their way of interacting, bright, quick, quiet and polite.

Today I got to watch some nice Japanese tourists. First a mother and her two young daughters. Both girls had their hair in a bob cut, only different lengths and texture. The older daughter who looked about eight had fly-away puffs of hair while her little sister had silken hair with that baby sheen. The mother approached me with a nod and a palm raised in question and asked in percussive French about Gaspard et Lisa aux Grands Magasin. It's the one where they go to Galerie Lafayette, a fancy department store and a monument of Paris.

I frowned at first and said I wasn't sure, remembering another customer earlier this month who almost bought it. A stylish Spanish woman who braved the dusty top shelf to bring down the oversized book in question. I had forgotten all about it frankly. I had also forgotten whether or not the woman had bought it, which today I delightfully discovered she had not.

Offering this delightful book to the lovely little girl from Japan today, seeing her face light up when she held it in her hands reminded me of what I love about this job.

outside over there

A woman came into the store looking for a Maurice Sendak book that we haven't had in stock for years. She looked nearly seventy with fuzzy silver hair and riveting wrinkles around lucid, watery blue eyes. She wore a floral purple shirt that made me wistful for summer. She spoke softly but direct like a yoga teacher, her words slipping through her relaxed smile in a holiday tanned face. There was a silent friend of hers wearing white lurking off to the side somewhere.

The woman talked about a Vietnamese movie in which the book had been referenced. I thought about the weather in Vietnam this time of year. Buggy, green, lush and warm. Maybe she got that tan on a beach there. Or shopping at a market in Saigon where she first wore that floral shirt, still crisp from her suitcase. I had to keep blinking these thoughts away as I searched for her book.

I wrote down the reference information and sent her up to the special orders desk. On her way upstairs she turned and said in that Zen-French way, "Too bad you're in the basement on such a nice day". I flashed a painful smile and watched her go. Then I chatted with my colleague Elise about Maurice Sendak, showing her In the Night Kitchen and saying he was un peu particulier as a writer. That's what I say when I'm not sure how to explain an artist to someone in French. They always know what I mean. French is cool that way.

So I work in the basement of the bookstore. That means underground. I can hear the Metro rumble by in it's own underground lair somewhere nearby. Customers often confuse this sound with thunder, glancing worried expressions towards the cieling. I can hear the street traffic up above rushing by in front of the store, especially those high-pitched European sirene sounds and the occasional demonstration or strike. The revolutionary spirit is alive and well in France, though a bit more organized and less bloody than back in the Robespierre days. The latest to storm the Bastille were supporters of the ceasefire in Lebanon. In the basement the sounds were muffled but I still had the sensation I worked under a carnival that day.

Sometimes it's cozy down there, like when people come in looking wet and rumpled with their soggy umbrellas and frazzled eyes. Other times it's oppressive, like when a tan yogi French woman in a floral shirt makes a comment about what a shame it is to be downstairs on such a beautiful day. Oh yeah, and when I go into the stock room with the strange medieval air shaft where I hear the echo of voices. There's a sink just there with a mirror and a ghastly fluorescent light where I wash up after lunch. One day I heard the eery mumbles of mens' voices laughing and such through the stone and cement. I thought customers had suddenly rushed into the stock room. Toothpaste dribbling down my chin, I bent my head up and first noticed the shaft.

It leads to a place on the street above where some cluster of businessmen come for their cigarette breaks. Although I couldn't show you the exact spot above ground, and that's not from lacking of trying. None of my coworkers have been any help either, even the veterans to the place. The heavy odor of burnt tobacco hangs in the air of the basement stock room like a bar just after closing. I heard one time firemen had to be called when a cigarette butt found its way down there and smouldered away, filling the stockroom with smoke.

Dangerous stuff, fire, in our line of work. Good thing the culprits are mostly bankers and lawyers. They'll be able to read us the fine print on our insurance policy afterwards.

the bookseller

La libraire is bookseller in French. I chose the French word because I am working at a French bookstore (librairie) in Paris and because things in French usually sound prettier than in English. I was hired by la librairie to run their children's books department which carries lots of books in English.

Having always been bookish (livresque) and English speaking, the job seemed a natural fit. What I have come to discover is that although I know books (livres), I was unaware of all the different people who come to buy them. A book is a predictable thing, a front and back cover and pages with words telling a story from beginning to end. People however come in all kinds of packaging with the most unpredictable, astonishing stories of whom I encounter only the abbridged versions.

So this blog is dedicated to the people I sell books to - people who make my life as a libraire possible and sometimes impossible.