Thanksgiving Post--Food, Family, Books, Thankfulness

I've been trying to think of a good Thanksgiving post. The store is closed for the day, but my family gets together these days outside of Phoenix, and I just don't feel comfortable being away for the weekend. That said, hi Merrill, Gus, Claudia, Les, Adam, Jocelyn, Chris, Mom, and several of Merrill's friends. My sister Merrill is currently reading Barbara Ehrenreich's Bright-Sided that I sent her as a gift, and liking it. She's not a fake positivity kind of person, so this is just another example of matching the right person with the right book. We still have some signed copies for the realistic people on your gift list.

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My friend Linda at Galaxy Books in Hardwick, Vermont recently sent me a nice email about how things have been going. (If you linked, notice we use the same template for our web site, but hers is in a soothing royal blue. She helped start a community restaurant in Hardwick, which is just part of the community's focus on local agriculture. In a holiday that is a celebration of food and bounty, it seemed like folks would like to see this piece from Dan Rather reports, which was originally shown on HDNet. Please consider watching this--it's very inspiring.

Broken record time. I was thinking of my favorite book that puts me in the Thanksgiving spirit and that is Michelle Huneven's Jamesland. It was out of stock for a while, but they must have done a reprint to take advantage of the publication of Blame. I was happy yesterday to talk to my friend Christy, and it's one of the few novels she's read this fall. We did a little sigh about the talents of Michelle Huneven and then moved on to talk about civic activism and the differences between being a volunteer and working for an organization. Jobs are jobs, and even with good ones in great fields, you get bogged down in the drudgery and the politics and the turf wars.

So is that the case owning the bookstore? Honestly, 14 hour days fly by, and not in a bad way. As you know, I am almost always tense and worried about something. What's the new competition going to do to my business? Why aren't businesses opening on our block? What are we going to run out of? Can we pay all our bills? (note to creditors, yes because we are still being very cautious), but thankfully, that doesn't get in the way of me loving every minute.

Thank you for helping make our first 237 days a wonderful experience. And Happy Thanksgiving.