shokufeh is…home

I seem to have fallen off my embracing-summer wagon. For a while, we were getting out of the house early, leaving work early, going to swimming classes, having impromptu snowballs….  Then stuff happened – we left town, we got sick, there are no swimming classes in August, the season is progressing and changing the morning light…  I’m feeling like summer is over, even though it’s not even mid-August. But our students come back in twelve days (with orientation next weeek), and many of the schools in the city are already in session. And doesn’t school = summer over?

But this morning, we were trying again, trying to get out of the house on the early side. When I dragged myself out of bed, I was wondering how helpful MrMan would be in achieving our goal, as he was still snuggling in the sheets like the sun didn’t exist. But I went to the kitchen and made my tea, got MrMan’s lunch, made his beloved cheese sandwich for breakfast.  As I was doing these things, I was thinking about the fact that he’s so physically capable of getting himself ready in the morning, but somehow not emotionally ready.  He can use the toilet, he can brush his own teeth (though not skillfully enough that I let him do it alone at night), he can get and change his own clothes, he likes to think he can brush his own hair and wash his own face.  But the thing that was keeping me from waking him was that he expects someone to accompany him through these tasks, and I was busy with other things.  So I’m standing in the kitchen, wondering when the emotional readiness catches up with the physical readiness.

Done with my stuff, I step out of the kitchen and am shocked to see MrMan standing in front of the bathroom sink, brushing his teeth. Sam thought I was the responsible party. I thought maybe Sam was, though I’d just seen him walk past from showering in the other bathroom, so it seemed unlikely. Apparently, the boy, without any nudging, left the bed-snuggling, and went to brush his teeth. Leaving me wondering which of us isn’t emotionally ready.

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Living here, I’m always saying goodbye to bits of the past.  Sometimes, it’s a building I spent time in as a child, replaced by an empty lot.  Other times, it’s the memories of the trees. (When I first moved back, every time I drove on Broadway, I was startled by the sun.  I recently realized that I’ve almost forgotten all the magnolias that once lined the street.)  For the past few months, I’ve been watching the building in which I had my first public health job be slowly deconstructed.

Earlier this week, my mom called and said she had bad news. My first thought was that something had happened to a family member. I was right. She told me that the bookshop was closing.

For eight years, my mother managed and part-owned Maple Street Children’s Bookshop.  It seems like much longer, but when I think about the fact that, in that time, I made my way from third grade to eleventh, it sounds right.  It was the place I spent much of my time, outside of home and school.  Anis and I would walk there after school, and spend the last few hours of the day. Naysan had a crib there for the first part of his life.  When he got a little older, I would pop him in the stroller and walk down to PJ’s (when it was in the 7700 block, on the opposite side of the street from where it is now) where we’d share a treat.  And when he was yet older, he went to the nursery school around the corner.

I would spend hours reading whatever my heart desired. Often while sitting in a low-slung wooden baby carriage in the back room.  It was designed for dolls, but was large enough for me to sit and read. I liked to accompany my reading with jelly bellys, bought at the corner of Cherokee at The Squirrel Cage, usually in the flavors of ice mint, bubblegum, and coffee. I would also shelve books, ring up customers, wrap presents…. I enjoyed it when I had lots of time to wrap the gifts and could give time and attention to stamping the paper just so, and maybe even coloring in a few details – like perhaps a gold tooth for George.

On Saturdays, if I wasn’t working, I would usually walk with my friends to Uptown Square, stopping in at the bookshop in at least one of the directions. In the summer, I spent time with other kids in the bookshop neighborhood – who either lived there, or had parents working along the street.  When I started junior high, and even high school, the bookshop was part of my identity, a way for me to connect with others. Either because I recognized them, or they recognized me, from their visits to the shop. It was a way to build community, with both customers and the other employees.

I went to high school up the street, so resumed my afternoon visits to the shop.  It was a place and a job that I loved. It’s why, whenever I spot a book out of place in a bookstore, I feel compelled to shelve it. It’s why I can enjoy a YA (young adult) book, with my only regret being that it’s not longer.  It’s why my child has overabundance of books, and a shared love of them.

When I was in eleventh grade, we left the shop.  My mother sold her share and stopped working there. It was a sad break for me and my brothers, but for me I think it was made easier that it was a clean break.  At around the same time, my high school moved to a different part of the city. And my family moved to a different neighborhood.  All of my routines changed.

But over the years, we’d stop in. Relive our memories, looking at the photographs on the wall of past events and people. Sit in the rocking chair.  Browse the shelves.  When I went with MrMan, I enjoyed watching him play with the same wooden baby carriage in which I spent many an adventure.  And buying for him books that I’d liked at his age and beyond.

But that is all coming to an end. In two weeks, the shop will close, and our memories will become all the more precious.

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