quidnovis61

(SORRRRYYYY... I wrote it in October and totally forgot to publish it...it was left in the "Save" file...!!)

 

Summer has given way to autumn.

 

Life has returned to a kind of somnolent normalcy after the intensive, effusive, short  Scandinavian summer... when everything happens in explosive urgency - (You see, we know what awaits around the corner - the long cold grey icy winter ready to ambush us). The colours now are so vibrant and radiant - bursting forth like a veritable van Gogh on my senses, nature's last and lovely smile of the year. L.M Montgomery's Anne of Green Gables says: "I am so glad I live in a world where there are Octobers."... I agree with her. Post-summer-Octobers are a time for retrospection and meditation.... with many flashbacks to feed my hungry soul.

 

I remember the second hand bookshops behind Park Street - (on Russell Street, Camac Street and so on) in Calcutta - where I spent many a teenage hour browsing. They are now fitted with modern shelves of light wood and are all alphabetically organised. Smartly dressed youngsters ask politely:

Any particular book you are looking for, madam?

(HEY! when did I become “Madam”? OMG...I was a girl in plaits just the other day...)

 

The musty smell of old books are now long gone, the piles on the floors where one had to be adept at Callisthenics in order to see the spines of the books are a part of my memories. Must one now have a “particular” book in mind...? The art of browsing is surely a dying one.

 

But here in Sweden (in the past 10 years or so...), my joy has returned! I go to all the Second Hand stores that have mushroomed in my town and our neighbouring towns.... They are run by volunteers from the Swedish Salvation Army, the Swedish Red Cross, Humanitarian Aid, the Free Churches. All these "shops" have a little shed outside which are always lit and the doors kept unlocked - some of them even have ramps so you may lug in heavy things like sofas etc. People leave in their clothes, shoes, books, crockery, cutlery, lamps etc that they no longer want and it is sold in these shops. The money thus earned (and often even clothes, toys etc) all go to various international aids - mostly to war-torn areas or wherever the need is.

 

Thus it is aid,  re-cycling...and pleasure! Three wonderful words....

 

Having a few minutes to spare when in town, I dive straight to the book-department.... and oh! what joys lurk in those shelves to ambush my senses... there are lovely oooold armchairs (also left there by some one) where you can sit and browse.... to my dismay, I have been so engrossed once that I forgot Time and came late to an appointment. She had a good laugh though when I told her why....and was not cross with me, thank goodness!

 

Rows and rows, shelf after shelf of books - what treasures! There are a few authors whom I just can't leave behind... James Hilton for example...(and as a result I have 3-4 copies of Good bye Mr Chips and other books by him, both in Swedish and English) A. A Milne (how can I leave poor Pooh Bear and Christopher Robin all alone on a shelf?), A. J Cronin (oh so much pleasure as I was growing up) James Herriot (such nostalgia!) ...to name but a few.....

 

And then there are books that I have wanted to read and suddenly the book is just THERE... waiting for me! At times it is a book I have read and do not have in my bookshelf and I just want to "have it". At other times I have bought a book and didn't find it to my liking - I have gone back to the shed and returned it for a re-sale - hoping it will give pleasure to someone else...the double proceeds thus helping some one in greater need in a far away war-torn country...

 

I bear these riches home triumphantly to sit in my sofa and spend many a dark Scandinavian winters day in an escapist mode - in an armchair, under a warm electric blanket, a cup of coffee (and OF COURSE...a piece of dark chocolate).

 

What an abundance of wealth for the ravenous soul.

 

Signing off for now.

C.S!
(Cresat Scientia)