Leafing Through

Leaf Bracelet on Etsy

Borders Bookstore is closing. I have an odd set of extremely strong feelings about this.

First I feel sadness and a longing for the past. Borders was my first favorite bookstore, and was the closest one to my house for a long, long time. When the first Barnes and Noble came to Madison, I felt like they were encroaching on the territory of My Borders.

But Barnes and Nobles did come to Madison, and privately I've started admitting to myself that they've replaced Borders as my favorite bookstore--if only because Borders has always had the poorest selection journals imaginable.

That didn't stop me from buying books there, and based on my experiences through the winter/Christmas season, I'm frankly rather surprised that they are closing. Especially this branch, which always seems to have a constant level of people, if not always a high one. I never suspected that Borders was this close to bankruptcy--but then, that's rather the point, I suppose.

And then there's the guilt.  See, I still buy books at Borders, but only when I don't buy them for my Kindle of otherwise from Amazon. I've gotten two novels at Borders in the past six months, and one Christmas gift. In comparison, I bought two journals from the used bookstore, one journal from B&N, one book from a garage sale, four paper books from Amazon, and god knows how many ebooks (most of them also from Amazon). I couldn't have kept Borders in business with my business, but it's because of people like me that an awesome chain of .dtf books is going bankrupt (.dtf is Dead Tree Format), and I'm rather sorry for my part in it.

Of course, my final feeling is glee. Books on SALE?? I shall go NOW! And I did. I went to Borders today, like a vulture, and bought $20 worth of stuff--it would have been about the same without the paltry 20% off, but whatever.  And I'll go again later when the savings are higher.

Although I hope the lines are way shorter. I got three chapters into one of the books I was buying while waiting in line. No joke. It was a great book and a fine way to pass the time, but perhaps next time I will go the day after they announce the newest tier of savings.