CommissionerStraightJacket
Saturday, January 31, 2009
Today has been a truly amazing day.
The Turtle saw an addy in the local newspaper for a Magick store in Delhi (pronounced Dell-high by the locals) which led to a decision to go to Delhi today. The Hare pushed, wiggled her ears and tail, thumped her back foot with her nose twitching furiously until I bathed dressed and we moved out.
The Magick store, which is called Avalon Moon is a nice little shop of its type, but actually I was more intrigued by a bookstore called Steinway Books which is a lovely bookstore with the same
stock-in-trade as myself, but they have a traditional store front convenient to the university.
However, the proprietress directed me to another store called the Biblio Barn which is so far out in the wilderness that one has to literally drive accross a covered bridge to get there.
Not only is Biblio Barn out in the middle of nowhere, but they have no online presence. This is fascinating to me because it is so diametrically opposed to the current contemporary wisdom and my own theory and practice. I have been relying on Abe books and online sales with no walk-in trade. Linda (the proprietress of Biblio Barn) advised me that my location in Pine Hill on route 28 is ideal for walk in trade and she kindly offered to refer people to me. This couldn't come at a better time.
Abe books recently merged with Amazon. I had harboured hopes that this would be good for me, but so far the obverse has proven to be true. My Abe books customers understood that they were ordering USED books. Amazon customers are so used to buying new books from Amazon that they complain if a $1.00 paperback or a $2.00 hardcover has the slightest water or coffee stain, the slightest tear in the dust jacket, etc. etc. They keep complaining, wanting their money back and half of them actually ask me if I want the book back. I suspect some of them are simply scamming free books by abusing the system.
In any event, the online component of the business seems to be falling off. It seems (although
London Fog would know better as she teaches business) that mergers in any given sector of the economy indicates that all is not well in that sector.
The book business has a hard core of readers who are adicted to the printed page. These are people who become bookstore owners or librarians. We are the type of people who read constantly, who have actually read the classics, people who become English Lit majors and who listen to the Prarie Home Companion.
I am not at my best with the online bookstore because what I do best is personal contact. I can sell over the phone because I can carry on a conversation and "shmooze" with people. I am could at direct personal sales for the same reason, because I genuinely like people as individuals even though I can't stand mobs.
It seems significant as well that my friend Antonia "Marilyn" Camberari who suggested that I resume writing in this blog belongs to the same "herectical" Catholic church as Lisa and H.L. from the Bibliobarn. Sometimes when I fall into abject despair the way is made plain.
Labels: The Book Business
I live in Pine Hill with the Turtle and the Hare. Today we are going to a town called Delhi to check out a Magick store. This leads me to some thoughts on the Pagan Community.
Here I will name some names and change others. I want to mention Nancy Venus and the folks who put together Beltane in the Park in Wantaugh every year because they are the best Pagans I've met, just genuine people who are fun to be around. They do Paganism right.
I've just been thinking about the Magick Businesss. There are jokes to the effect that the difference between Pagans and Christians is that we meet in stores rather than Churches thus eliminating any hypocrocy about the fact that religion is a for profit business.
I used to hang out at Magickal Childe when Hermann Slater owned the place in the late 1970's and early 1980's. I met some incredible people there including he late Israel Regardie, Isaac Bonwits, Margot Adler and a host of other people who are big names in the neo-Pagan movement. It was also where I met my first transsexual when I was just beginning to realilse what was up with me.
I've worked so far at a store called Magickal Wonders with a woman named Lady Morganna who is wonderul in her own way. She's a little hard to work with because like all High Priestesses she has an ego and a bit of a domineering personality but I guess that 's what comes from representing the Goddess on earth and she's a hell of a lot more fun than the Pope ever was. I taught classes, read Tarot cards, minded the store and was lucky to make $20 a week.
I later worked at a place called Magickal Realms which is housed in the same building as
Original Products which is this huge Botanica in the Bronx that makes the statues for all of the other Botanicas. I would not have missed the experience of having worked there for the world because I got a good education in Santareia, bought some good Magick books for a discount and had a lot of fun. Lady Rhea runs the place, makes her own candles and enjoys being Queen of her own Castle and that's as it should be. The trouble with working there was that there were five Tarot readers to a customer tripping over each other. I felt to much like I was still on the stroll
And of course, even though I took the site down
everyone knows about the cockateu store in Woodstock gave me the bird.
Now I have my own couple of clients who come to see me and get their cards read. I charge half of what I had to charge in a store and keep what I make. I read for a couple of hours if I feel like it. I read for free if I want to. It's a hell of a lot better to feel free than to feel cheap.
Commissioner Straight Jacket, aka the Princess of Darkness
Labels: The Commissioner is Back
