Sarah's Books - Used & Rare

Business has been dismal the last several weeks and I spent the morning putting up holiday lights and displaying winter-themed books, and for whom? Absent customers, or perhaps simply to entertain myself? Times like this I feel kind of like a kid playing "bookstore." If you have a shop and no one buys much of anything, is it still a shop, or merely an attractive storage facility? I look around, and find that yes, I do have many good books for sale, I have a check-out desk, shopping bags and change at the ready, and good signage outside. I've ordered some cool remainders for the holidays (books I'd be happy getting as gifts myself) - they arrive today - and I'm even bringing in some cedar boughs from home to give the shop a pleasant aroma. I mean, it smells fine - no moldy books here, by god - but the greenery gives the place some freshness, now that it's too cold to have windows or doors open (fourteen degrees at dawn yesterday, brrr). I'm heading to my sister Kate's house for Thanksgiving, then coming back to open the shop on Friday and Saturday, to be here in case folks eschew the hideous mall sprawl nearby and come downtown to browse around instead. I do hope so. Ryan and I went to a decent little friends-of-the-library sale over the weekend, and I've got a lot of good books on hand. Build it and they will come, right? That's what I've always believed. If this entire season is dismal, not just these past couple of weeks, I'll think I'll be casting around for Plan B. Not to be a Scrooge, but jeeze louise. Someone please remind me next year that early- to mid-November is a great time to take a vacation.