From the book of Tiny Pleasures, I spotted this one:
When I did my recent book purge, I discovered that in the past, I had a tendency to grab whatever was handy to use as a bookmark (despite several posts this year featuring the abundance of bookmarks I own).
Here are a few of the things I found tucked into books I’m rehoming:
Three actual bookmarks: one with an inspirational saying, one from the Doris Day Animal League, to which I was a contributor long before I worked in animal rescue, and one with other state and Texas locations of Half Price Books.
Two business cards, one from the bookstore where I was employed as an assistant manager starting a few months after we moved to Houston, and one promoting The Deal and Three Fortunes In One Cookie, with contact information on the back.
A red ribbon decal that was probably part of a donation appeal from an HIV/AIDS-related organization.
A thank-you card from Amy after she spent a summer living on the second floor of our fifth Houston home (The Compound was our sixth, and Houndstooth Hall is our seventh; between our first and third, we spent the summer of 1990 living with Lynne and Craig. I guess we paid their hospitality forward with Amy; then here at the Hall, Lynne and Minute lived with us for a few weeks between homes). So many good friend memories.
I emailed Amy photos of the message she wrote inside the card, and we reminisced about those times. The envelope is postmarked September 1, 1994, when a postage stamp was 29 cents.
I don’t know, I usually find a bunch of words betwixt the pages of a book.
Recently, I have been reading Kirk Read’s How I Learned to Snap while having brunch at a local restaurant I like. It’s a thick pitch black hardback book with less than an inch of pages, with the paper sleeve off. But, it’s hard to keep open without a heavy weight on top. I suspect that’s because I may have only done this once before. Then, I discovered a non-punctured frequent buyer’s card from Bollo’s, Blacksburg, VA inside. Those memories definitely lifted my mood up higher. There hasn’t been a safe place like Bollo’s and Gillies around the places I’ve been in since.
I just took a virtual tour of Bollo’s, a place where I’d gladly have coffee and something sweet while reading. That led me to do a little research on Blacksburg, other than the tragedy with which I’m already familiar. I then placed the location where a peripheral character (mentioned only by association in the chapter I’m currently working on) lives as that city. See the impact you can have on someone’s creativity?
“So, you see, it’s all a show, happy ending and all. And, that just makes me want to sing!>” – Herbert, Act 2 Finale, Monty Python’s Spamalot
As Foretold.
“As foretold” just made me snort with laughter.
I have dozens of bookmarks ( I collected them when I was at school), but I still end up using till receipts and coffee stirrers.
I’d posted all the ones I’ve found, and the other day, I opened a drawer somewhere and there were a bunch more! Pretty sure when I remember which drawer it was, I’ll photograph and post them on a future Sunday Sundries.
One thing I value about them is that they remind me of places we visited when I was a kid.