Can barely predict the mutable Aprils up here. Nobody can. The day warm, in the sixties, without a cloud and if you sit by the stone wall, on that bench in the nook, you’ll soak rays warm and peaceful. Here that tales of love laced with beer take place with Dave. He sits with that poor schmo who works in the gift shop. Ritual with the two: meet at the bench equidistant between their two stores and drink ale until the sun sets. Never mind public alcohol consumption laws, open-container policing. A fine day and their stories are regular. Except for the odd-looking and over-lipsticked helicopter pilot in Vegas. Now, the wind tells anybody who notices must be a storm coming. Be here tomorrow. Front moving through and April sunshine turns to April showers and showers snow. Freezing cold, in the twenties. Enjoy it now, Dave says. Meanwhile, inside his shop, Karen sits and reads a book and sips her coffee and she wins patron of the year. Dave remarks that he should hang a picture on the wall patron of the year. This woman Karen enters everyday and everyday she drinks coffee and eats a brownie and posts in the corner by the window, above the river, and reads. All kinds of books and that doesn’t matter. She minds her own business and you can barely coax a peep. Every now and then the caffeine takes hold, in unison with synapse, and she’s off and running and you can’t redirect anything but you wouldn’t want to. Wind toss blow and it’s maddening; it’s insane; not a cloud in the sky. A wooden chair falls over and rolls once. Papers fly and spin, hold for a moment suspended, then careen to the wall and stick. A window slams. Dust, dirt and leaves dance into the shops and both proprietors close their doors. Damn, stronger than we thought, one says. Then the sound. Dave holds up a finger, “Stop, did you hear that?” What? He doesn’t hear a thing; maybe a cardboard box skidding across the road. No, a tree just fell; I heard it; a tree just fell. No way. Let’s investigate. Dave leads the way, fast, stairs to the upper parking lot. He says, “These locusts, anyway, brittle: they can bend, but at a certain point they just go; should have closed this lot.” They don’t have to walk far to see it. Massive limb from one of the mature trees fell. The windshield of Karen’s car- patron of the year- smashed a hole and the spiderweb crack. A side rear window also shattered. Glass on the hood; glass in the parking lot dirt; glass all over her seats. Limb punched through the window. Speared into the driver’s seat at an angle. Karen sits behind the wheel and clutches with both hands, fingers white, face pale. Eyes wide, expressionless, facing the two men as they approach.
Best Bookstore in North America
On the Sawmill River. Skinny dip below the old dam in a cold pool near the prayer circle and labyrinth. Lovelace read his poems there, Bill Monahan read his shit, too, and a bunch of now-famous writing motherfuckers from various MFAs. Tiny Tim played a show on the upper floor. One older woman published a book and held a reading - one person showed up: Precarious Birch. He gave her all the love he could. Lovelace wrote a memoir in the cupola. There’s still a desk up there, but nobody knows how to access that spectacular writing space. Pilgrimage, the thing, stop by The Raven on your way, Harvard Square or Northampton. Every single time there’s a book divined especially for you. Spectacularly, as mentioned elsewhere, Precarious found Erik Erikson in Maine. But that particular book belonged on Somes Sound. In Massachusetts, escorted by a painter, Precarious and his partner entered, and, faced up on the New Arrivals table - Gandhi’s Truth. Now get naked and swim.