Brick and Mortar

The joy of shopping is in the journey!

If I have ever heard a sound worse than my cat howling for food in the pre-dawn hours while I was experiencing a madness-inducing degree of jet lag, I can’t recall it. Under normal circumstances, I would tell anyone who asked that my three least favorite sounds of my lifetime were my parents fighting, my cat coughing, and my wife crying in another room. Given the state I was in after returning from three weeks in Europe, however, the vocalization of my feline friend’s crepuscular yearnings were blunt force trauma delivered directly into the soul of someone who had already, temporarily, lost the will to live. Make no mistake, though, Fuzz Aldrin did more than her part in restoring me to the world and making me feel I was truly back home by spending most of the first week after my return being an almost non-stop purring machine. Though her purr is not among my three all-time favorite sounds, there has been no more healing sound that I can recall. And because I have no doubt that inquiring minds want to know, my three favorite sounds, in no order of preference, are: Fuzz galloping down the long, hardwood floor of our hall; My cowboy boots on the dusty streets of the long-gone old west town at Paramount Ranch; My wife’s laughter wafting in from another room.

The hardest part of being away for so long was to be apart from my cat. These animals choose to spend their whole lives with us and though a bit of separation is probably good for both of us, three weeks is a significant portion of Fuzz’s lifespan. Obviously, I want her to live forever, but realistically, I can only count on a thirty or forty year lifespan (she will be fourteen this August)! This is why Fuzz usually travels with us. Of course, although she does great on airplanes, flying to Europe is just way too long a trip, and if jet lag could lay me up for a week upon my return, what would it do to a creature so tiny? So, we arranged a full rotation of people to check in on her during our absence, three visits per day, each of the visitors understanding the importance of sending us pictures and the occasional video.

I had thought we would see many cats in Venice. It is, after all, a city well known for its feline population as historically cats played a valuable role in keeping rats and mice away from the canals. Apparently, new methods for controlling the pest problem are being utilized and the cat population has dramatically decreased. And it isn’t like the crowds were scaring them into hiding. We were there the second week of March and by nightfall the narrow, ancient streets were deserted, and still we only saw one cat (though we did see more when we visited other islands). In fact, the most crowded location we visited, Libreria Acqua Alta, one of the most famous bookstores in the world, is renowned for its resident cats and we did not see them. Of course, it was so crowded that I really couldn’t spend much time there without feeling claustrophobic, and I am someone who ordinarily loves soaking in the ambience of bookstores.

Whenever I next return to Venice, I hope I might find a time to browse Libreria Acqua Alta when it is not so busy, but I doubt there is ever such a time. I can at least find comfort in that fact, however, as it means it is unlikely the shop will face the fate that befell so many of my favorite bookstores which are now defunct. The first bookstore with which I ever fell in love was A Clean Well-Lighted Place for Books, an independent store in Cupertino, California, that opened in 1975. Named for the Ernest Hemingway short story and located in the Oaks Shopping Center, the bookstore was the first I ever went to that offered its patrons free coffee. In other words, I was always meant to go there! It had an extensive selection of titles and a warm and inviting atmosphere (did I mention the coffee?). The store closed in 1998. Somehow, the shopping center held on til the early days of this decade, but has since been replaced by Silicon Valley housing.

Shortly after the start of the 21^st century, while visiting my friend Mike Stewart in New York City, I discovered Partners and Crime in the Village. This independent bookseller specialized in mysteries and crime thrillers. So, did my father. So, this shop, in the city of his birth, became a go-to stop for me whenever Father’s Day, his birthday, or Christmas were approaching. By the time I fell in love with Lily Holleman, I was pretty much splitting time between New York’s West Village and L.A.’s Los Feliz Village. On her first trip to stay with me in New York, I took Lily to Partners and Crime. I already knew that she was, in fact, going to be my lifelong partner-in-crime, and though I don’t remember what we purchased that day, the photo of us outside the shop was an absolute keeper. Unfortunately, the bookstore proved not to be a keeper. It closed its doors for the last time in September of 2012. The New York Times reported on its closure, attributing it to a combination of factors that included the rising use of electronic readers and the decline of business for independent bookstores. Sadly, after 18 years of specializing in genre fiction, it seemed crime no longer paid.

My all-time favorite used bookstore was located in Los Gatos, California, a quaint town west of San Jose, nestled in the foothills of the Santa Cruz Mountains, whose history dates back to the 1850s and the operation of four lumber mills. The Curious Book Shoppe (spelled with the extra “p” and “e” at the end simply to – as George Carlin might say – “piss people off”) was a place where among other prized possessions I obtained was a ridiculously inexpensive early edition of Hemingway’s The Sun Also Rises. Unfortunately, my patronage of the shop came to an abrupt end many years before it went out of business.

On one of the fairly frequent trips I would take back to my old stomping grounds in that area, I stopped in, and overheard an exchange between the shopkeeper and a visitor whose accent screamed “England” (and was therefore probably attracted to the store by the aforementioned extra “p” and “e” at the end of “shop”). The visitor commented on the charms of the town and hoped for help in pronouncing its name correctly, clearly not confident in any Spanish he might have picked up during his life. The shopkeeper pronounced it with pride, “Los Gatos,” and with delight offered, “It means ‘the gates’.”

I stared in disbelief. The shopkeeper had to be joking. Right? I mean there was a cat in the store’s logo! But he wasn’t joking. I slammed the book I was examining back on the shelf, glared at the shopkeeper and exclaimed, “It means ‘the cats’!” And with that, I stormed out, and never set foot in the store again. We all have to draw a line somewhere and my line had definitely been crossed.

We here in Los Feliz are quite lucky that far from losing our beloved independent bookstore it actually expanded into the Arts Annex in 2008. Of course, just now, in wanting to double-check that information, I went to the Skylight Books website to see a blank page with the following cryptic message in small font: An unknown error occurred. I gasped and almost called them, but then thought better of it because, after all, who makes phone calls any more? Instead, I opened a different browser and the website loads fine. So, it must just be that my Chrome is out of date. Unfortunately, I can’t update it because that would require updating the operating system, and my Mid-2012 MacBook Pro has been updated as far as it can. It is, ostensibly, fully functioning, but with built-in obsolescence. And to that, I can definitely relate.

Famous outside Los Feliz for its ongoing speaker series, featuring authors reading from their works, Skylight Books is almost as famous locally for its feline residents. First there was Lucy, who lived in the store for almost ten years. She was a regular fixture in the store’s window displays. One day, I went to Skylight on a literature emergency. I was reading Jonathan Franzen’s 2001 masterpiece The Corrections. I had purchased it new in hardback, yet, for some strange reason, an entire chapter was missing! I could return it and get a new copy, of course, but I was so riveted by the book that all I had in mind was grabbing a copy, sitting down in the store and reading the missing chapter immediately. This is what I started to do when Lucy hopped up next to me and curled up beside me, keeping me company the whole time.

This led to me making in-store reading time a regular occurrence. Not always, but frequently, Lucy would let me know she was glad I was there. And my in-store reading times continued even after Lucy departed for the great bookstore in the sky. I never really befriended Franny, the cat that became the store’s mascot a couple of years after Lucy’s death. Franny definitely became a customer favorite, though, and I kept up my in-store reading sessions.

In fact, one day, I brought my young goddaughter in so that I could read her something that was not available at the library, where, frankly, we had exhausted most of the titles. Theanna was young enough to still enjoy reading time with her godfather, but not so young that she wasn’t intrigued by the young boy playing a handheld video game nearby. He was aware of her being aware of him and he moved ever closer. Without directly looking at Theanna, it was nevertheless clear that he craved her attention. He had it, half the time. The other half was spent wanting to know what was going on in the book I was showing her.

The boy began to audibly react to the exciting things going on in his game, such was his desperation to pry Theanna’s attention away from an adult (a parallel perhaps to how his accompanying adult’s attention had quite clearly been pried away from him). Ultimately, Theanna’s imagination won out and I, and the book, eventually had her undivided attention. I knew, however, that she would not soon forget the video game and the excitement it seemed to provide someone close to her own age. I had won this round, but I sensed a window closing.

Back in Venice, As Lily and I strolled away from Libreria Acqua Alta and towards the famed Rialto Bridge, I found myself thinking of bookstores and cats. This is precisely when Scriba, a bookbinding shop, caught Lily’s eye. We went inside and within a matter of minutes, we were ready to spend a significant portion of our shopping budget there on the first full day of our almost three week European adventure. We showed restraint, promising we would return. The really cool, artsy, and very attentive Venetian who helped us either didn’t care, or didn’t believe us. Or both. Nevertheless, we were true to our word and when we came back several days later, it took her a while, but she finally remembered us, and the warmth with which she treated us felt genuine as she shared some personal details of her life in Venice.

My big purchase at Scriba, something I knew I would regret not bringing back home with me, was a small, framed painting on leather canvas of Lorenzo de’ Medici (“Lorenzo the Magnificent”) depicted as an orange tabby cat! He is clad in a red cloak, is seated at a desk and is hard at work writing a manuscript, a long quill pen in his right paw. Il Duomo, the Cathedral of Santa Maria del Fiore in Florence is plainly visible through the window behind him, appropriate, as Lorenzo was the de facto ruler of the Florentine Republic. He was also a statesman and a great patron of the Renaissance arts. As such, he has become almost a “patron saint” figure for artists throughout Italy, just as cats have been protectors of creative endeavors throughout the western world, at least.

Traveling to other countries is a good reminder to be grateful for “brick and mortar” shopping opportunities. The conveniences of online shopping disappear from mind and the joys of in-person shopping retu

rn, from picking up needed items at pharmacies to finding delightful wardrobe additions at clothing stores, or searching for the perfect souvenir that will bring back joyous memories of far-flung locales. Getting away from the city of Venice and exploring the islands of Murano and Burano not only allowed us to learn about life in the region, it also afforded us great shopping opportunities!

Murano is famous the world over for its traditional glass making. Burano is home to legendary lace makers. It turns out both of these art forms are endangered. In Murano, the glass blowing technique is specific to that island and its secrets are not to leave, which prevents production in that particular fashion elsewhere. At one point (pre-pandemic) there were 70 companies licensed to create these works of art. Now, there are only eleven. On Burano, the school that taught the tradition of lace making has closed, and as with glass blowing, young people are not interested in putting in the many years of apprenticeship it takes to master the art form.

Murano has a population of 5,000 and I bet there is a lot to see on the island other than the works of art being created, but I greedily soaked up every minute I had at the New Murano Gallery. Had I a fortune, I would gladly have spent a sizable portion of it there. As it is, we came away with a few prized glass possessions, including a beautiful, colorful shot glass (that has been used often since our return!) and two black cats on a gondola! Burano, with a population of only 2,700 people, is a haven for tourists, boasting colorful houses painted vibrantly so that the fishermen can easily find their ways home. We enjoyed the sights, but mostly we enjoyed shopping at the lace store Dalla Olga, where we got to see one of the masters plying her trade. We came away with several treasures that either brought Lily profound joy or that we know will make wonderful gifts. Lily was quite moved by the ladies of Dalla Olga, by their artistry and by the works they have created through the years. Honestly, so was I. I hope someday I am able to go back there, and if I am, I hope “Laces by Olga” will still be there.

Several of my favorite shops in this country have gone out of business, unique stores where I found many gifts I was delighted to purchase for family and friends. North of the Falls in Bradford, Vermont, was a can’t miss treasure trove, until it closed down. Here in Los Feliz, I was a fan of Happy, a big fan of Maya, and I absolutely loved Show. All of these are no more. There are several other, once reliable go-to spots for gifts, both here and in the D.C. Metro area (where I spend the Christmas season) where I no longer feel I am seeing new merchandise, just the same items as the previous couple years.

I don’t know what I would do if my two favorite shops in the neighborhood these days were to go under. One is Spitfire Girl on Hillhurst. It has proven to be, time and time again, the perfect place to get gifts for the women I love the most be it my wife, my sister-in-law, my mother-in-law or my dear friend, Kelly Lawlor. Don’t get me wrong, the store has gifts for everyone, not just women, but the boutique has proved especially powerful in providing unique, artistic gifts for the women in my life who are all, well, unique and artistic. One of the most recent finds there, in case you were wondering (and I sense you were), was most assuredly cat-themed: white Persian cat ceramic bookends by Lefton (the perfect accompaniment to the Lefton owl ceramic bookends we already owned).

My other favorite boutique in Los Feliz is Sumi’s on Vermont, which feels right, because I don’t want to play favorites between Hillhurst and Vermont. I love both my village streets equally. I wish I could hang out at Sumi’s on the regular, even when I have no need to purchase one of the remarkable or beautiful or humorous or otherwise delightful handcrafted gifts they have on offer. It’s seriously so much fun to be in that store! The musical playlist alone is always killer. I’ve told them that dropping in there, with the Acid Jazz vibe of the music, makes me feel like I’ve dropped into an after-hours nightclub in Tokyo in the mid 1990s. Trust me, there are no higher compliments I could pay.

One of our favorite things Lily and I have ever witnessed in any store took place in Sumi’s. A young boy had taken in the store’s inventory and announced to his mother, “What this store needs is more cat stuff.” Now, there actually is a great deal of “cat stuff” in Sumi’s. I mean A LOT of cat stuff. All of it is excellent. Yet, the boy was onto an important truth, namely that no matter how much cat stuff you may have, you can, and probably should, always have more.

Truthfully, it was the awareness of how much fun I have whenever I drop into Sumi’s that served as the early inspiration for this essay. Then, the gratitude I felt for my shopping experiences in Venice reinforced that inspiration. I have been long aware of the challenges faced by the small business proprietor, especially those involved in retail. It wasn’t until I made friends with members of the Los Feliz Village Business Improvement District, however, that I realized how bleak the economic terrain might really be for these entrepreneurs. And that was before all these tariffs!

Just between us, I have to admit I would not be sure how to even spell “tariffs” without spellcheck. And I certainly don’t understand what they are.

Of course, both those attributes probably qualify me for a job in the current administration!