Captured by the Moment: Tower Books, Part 3

Looking back on my bookstore years, it's amazing how many things I remember with perfect clarity. Mundane, everyday moments are captured for eternity. I'd worked retail before Tower, but not consistently 40-hour weeks. That was new territory for me. I had naïvely thought that everyone who came into the bookstore would be nice. People who like to read are polite, aren't they? Not necessarily. That was rude awakening #1. People, whether they're readers or not, are just plain cranky if you don’t have what they want (even if they don’t know exactly what it is). Our being out of the book of the moment was the most common complaint. Never mind publishers underestimating print runs or distributors failing to deliver. It was our fault if we didn't have a given book.

The phones kept us as busy as the customers in the store. The following might seem scripted, but we really got calls like this every day.

Clerk: Tower Books, may I help you?

Customer: Is this the record store?

Customer: Do you have the book that was on Oprah today?

Clerk: Which book?

Customer (incredulous): Didn't you watch Oprah?

Customer: Do you have (Book of the Moment)

Clerk: No, I'm sorry, we're out right now.

Customer: How can you be out of it? It's so popular!

Clerk from Watt Avenue: Can you do a book check?

Sunrise clerk: Sure, what's the title?

Watt clerk: The Donner Party Cookbook.

(There was a certain amount of hazing when new employees were hired. Our neighboring record store used to send their newbies over to borrow the shelf-stretcher).

As anyone who has worked retail can attest, dealing with the public can be...challenging. And while I have enough rude customer stories to make me inclined to agree with Ron Swanson, there were plenty of nice customers too, our regulars, who just enjoyed hanging out in the store, browsing away an afternoon, looking for the next book to put on the must-read stack. Rainy days were especially busy. There's something about a stormy afternoon that makes a bookstore the perfect respite. The old Sunrise store was small and cozy, with dark wooden racks in the aisles and along the walls. Away from the sales counter, away from the ringing phones, beeping registers (the best of mid-80s technology) and clerk/customer exchanges, there was, at times, an almost library-like hush, as if people thought they could keep the clamor of the outside world at bay a little longer if they could preserve that peace.

I've always said I'd have stayed at the bookstore forever if I didn't need to work to make a decent income. The harsh reality is that retail doesn't pay a living wage. I mean, if your idea of "living" includes fewer than three roommates and a vehicle that runs. It was clear that the managers at my area stores weren't going anywhere, so I made the decision to transfer to the main office in West Sac. It was the right move, but it took a few years to embrace. I was still technically a bookseller while working in the advertising department, then later as a buyer, but the immediacy was missing. What I've come to realize in the nearly eight years since Tower's doors closed for good is that for those of us who truly love books, being a bookseller isn't just something we do, it’s something we are.