March 12, 2008: Gah! Strangers!
My favorite used bookstore on Earth, Chamblin Bookmine, is in the process of budding: in addition to their sprawling main warehouse near me in Riverside, they're opening a classy coffee house boutique bookstore downtown near the library.
In preparation for this, they've hired new staff. The old familiar staff, faces and names I've known for a decade, are now being transferred to the downtown flagship store which isn't as convenient or well-stocked as the one nearby.
So now when I walk into a place of comfort and happiness, there are a bunch of weird people glowering at me. I mean, they're nice, I guess, but to them I'm not a regular or anything.
Is it a sign of my further descent into an Emily Dickinsonian agoraphobia that I find it existentially disturbing to see odd people running my bookstore?
