“You wouldn’t believe the number of books in this house,” my ever-loving spouse exclaimed upon entering his sister’s house in Fredericksburg, Virginia after her unexpected death.
“Don’t you dare bring another book into this house,” I boomed before checking myself. “I’m so sorry. I know how difficult this is for you.”
Sorry serving as a double entendre for the death and the veto of bringing more books into our house.
Susie was seven years older than my spouse and while they had similar intellectual sensibilities, they were worlds apart emotionally. She was a private person who didn’t buy into the know-all and share-all philosophy to which I subscribe, though she did enjoy an occasional raucous holiday with my side of the family. She had no children nor much interest in today’s youth, had been married twice eons ago, and had finally found great joy with Bob in the final days of her life.
Unbeknownst to any of us, including herself, cancer was getting the better of her. By the time she finally went to the hospital she could barely breathe and it was too late for treatment.
Susie was well-educated, quick-witted, historically-minded, and an avid collector of all things – spatulas, umbrellas, glass figurines, lamps, eye glasses, jewelry, framed artwork, wine, power tools, pets, and most of all books.
When I saw the initial photos of the book room – filled with wall-to-wall shelves and piles of books yet to be catalogued, I knew I had to work my magic. After all, bibliophilia is real.
My biggest fear was that our home in New Jersey would become a foster fail for thousands of dusty and well-annotated books. I landed upon Fred Books, calling them and only them, all because of a Google review that read, “This is the most magical place for books.”
It proved to be both a magical and serendipitous phone call.
“Start boxing the books,” I reported back to the spouse who was sifting through his sister’s belongings while I was 300 miles away managing a bathroom renovation and a leaky roof, trying not to dwell on the death of our beloved 15-year-old pooch who left us one day prior to Susie’s hospitalization.
By the time I joined him in Virginia over the weekend, there were at least 50 boxes of books stacked by the rocking chairs on the wrap-around porch waiting for Fred Books to come and cart them away.
“You think they’ll show up? ” I wondered.
“They’ll show up,” the spouse answered. “The question is, will they actually take the books?”
Shockingly, they did.
Because I’m a curious sort, I learned within minutes that Larry is older than he looks, Carlo has a young tot with an adorably dexterous name, the two of them met at random book sales (plural), they finally gave into fate and opened a store of their own, and that Larry’s wife, Cynde had just left her job at FEMA and was starting a new venture giving new life to old treasures.
“You think she’d want something like this?” I asked holding up an undefinable glass something.
Larry’s eyes lit up.
And so I began snatching many colorful curio items and filling boxes for the Cynde I had yet to meet rather than sending them off with good will to dubious donation centers.
Out went another dozen boxes.
“These guys are probably scammers,” I said a couple days later after Carlo, Larry, and Cynde left with their fifth car-load full of more books and treasures. “You think there’s really even a book store?”
My life is a constant quest for befriending random people. I welcome the unwelcomable, I talk to the strangest of strangers and I dig deep into the psyche and stories of anyone I encounter. And while I live for launching new relationships, I'm inexplicably cautious about being duped. My sister, usually eager to amplify my conspiracy theories about human nature, offered an unexpected response:
“Do you care? The books are gone. Besides, it’s not like they stalked the obituaries and came looking for us. YOU called them.”
“But who does this?” I asked. “They said they’re coming back to help us again next week.”
Another raised eyebrow.
My sister-in-law’s beautiful four-bedroom house on a wooded lot in Virginia was chock full of fabulous finds, but because of the sheer distance and my spouse’s need to be on constant alert for breaking news meant we didn’t have the luxury of time. We needed to salvage what we could, repurpose what we couldn't, gift as much as possible, and move as quickly as our aching senior citizen bones would allow.
Once word spread of Susie’s death, friends showed up with open hearts. Gary drove over several times from Charlottesville, Jeff came from Philadelphia on two consecutive weekends to assess the artwork, Nancy traveled from DC to box books (going home with only a couple rolls of high-end wrapping paper), Kat graced us with her grace two different times, and Bob was there almost every day, even when we weren’t. My sister, Nancy, a master of estate sales, downsizing, cleaning, transforming, repurposing, triaging and everything in between, was the foreman who kept us focused on the finish line. As we cleaned out the house we welcomed friends and neighbors offering muscle, solace, and hope.
At the crux of it all was Cynde and Carlo and Larry.
That is who does this.
We spent a month of long weekends unearthing a lifelong library of possessions, sorting through letters dating back to World War II, shaking our heads wondering why she kept this battered whisk, that cracked serving dish, or these mismatched earrings (Swedish Death Cleaning was invented for a reason). And yet we persisted.
By the end of our feat, hundreds and hundreds of boxes and items for their Fabulous Finds shelf had been loaded into Larry and Carlo’s vehicles and carted off to Fred Books where they’ll find new homes during their next sale on August 20th. The books that don't make the cut get donated back to the community through the many connections they've made and nurtured. They believe with all their hearts that every book deserves a second chance and that even the ghastliest don’t belong in landfills.
As we pulled the door shut behind us last weekend, Larry showed up once again.
“Want to go see the bookstore?”
Of course we did.
“This is what we should do when I retire,” my spouse said, looking longingly at the shelves and shelves of books. “What a perfect job.”
I grimaced at the thought of carrying hundreds of boxes out of dead people’s houses, storing other people’s junk in my garage, living room, bedroom and kitchen while inventorying thousands of items into Google docs. But then I thought about the characters I would meet, the books I would save, the stories I could tell, the people I could help.
“Absolutely perfect,” I answered.
I know we’ll never own a used bookstore.
But at that moment standing there with Larry in the place he and Carlo had built from nothing more than a love of books and people, I realized that just about anything is possible. Six weeks ago we showed up in Fredericksburg, sad and shocked with no plan, no contacts, and no reason to believe that we’d go home feeling good about any of it.
And yet there we were, filled with warm and fuzzy feelings about all we had accomplished, thanks to a little help from our friends.
Which for some misdirected reason made me start thinking about the fractured world we live in. How a misspoken phrase, misaligned political view, misunderstood religious belief, or a misinterpreted tattoo can sever a relationship, incite a riot, and turn everything inside out and upside down.
Larry texted yesterday: “It has been over a week since we all spoke, so I just wanted to toss out a “hello, and we miss ya!”
Which way more logically, led me to imagine what a magical place the world would be if we could all live our lives just a little bit more like Larry.
This is the best one yet. (And I say that almost every time.)
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