I went to the bookstore today to buy a book. It’s part of my Buy a Book, Save the World thing, which you can read about here, and even though I still think it’s a good idea to buy at least a few of the hundreds of books I buy at retail price, I would be omitting a truth if I didn’t tell you that I resent that $24.95, just a little.

When I walked in, a very nice elderly gentleman met me at the door, offering to direct me where I wanted to go. I didn’t actually know where my book would be– when was the last time I looked for a book without a search bar?– so I let him walk me over to the biography section. He complained that they had rearranged the store and he didn’t know where anything was anymore, and he had to ask one of the other clerks (also an older man) where it was. We passed the cafe, and I realized that there might not be a single other person besides myself in the store under 45. That said, most of the tables were full at noon on a Saturday, which seemed like a good sign, for the economy or book publishing or maybe just fraternity in general.

Of course, I had barely noticed the aging population of the Arlington Borders population when my assumptions were proved wrong. I ended up in line behind three teenage girls and someone’s mom. I’d grabbed the September issue of Vogue, not because I like it better than Paris or British Vogue, which truth to tell are more interesting, but because the store only had the August issues of the latter two. One of the girls eyed the magazine, and then me, looking skeptical, which is maybe appropriate since I was wearing an old and poorly-fitting concert tee with equally ancient flipflops. She was dressed like only a 14-year-old girl can when she is trying very hard to be cool and effortless at the same time, and although that didn’t make her look anything more like she belonged on the pages of Vogue than I did, the outfit earned points for effort, I think. She had a big raindrop-shaped birthmark on the back of her arm, falling on the diagonal, and I wonder if she was insecure about it because she kept brushing it absent-mindedly with her other hand. I noticed that she wasn’t carrying anything, and neither were any of the other girls, though the mom had a book.

The guy behind me, who was about as old as everyone else in the store, this group of girls excluded of course, was carrying a cd, and when he shuffled into me, no doubt due to his decrepit state, he told me I had very pretty eyes and that I should use them to my advantage, and that if I was single I was being way too picky, which may be true, and then he called the cashier a yo-yo when he dropped a book on the floor. I tried to think back to the last time I bought a cd, (I don’t remember) and the first time, when I was about this girl’s age and what I remember the most is how terribly grown-up I felt to be graduating from cassettes. It’s only interesting because I would be very surprised if this girl had ever bought a cd in her life. If she’s smart, which she seemed to be, she buys things online and in digital form where possible, and was probably a little bored to be standing here. No doubt they were on their way somewhere more interesting and mom made them stop to buy a book since moms are old-fashioned and don’t get the world at all. She wasn’t looking at the chotchkes in the checkout line or talking to her friends even, just occasionally touching the birthmark on the back of her arm.

And looking at that birthmark and turning around to smile at the practically-dead man behind me who actually still listens to cds like I do sometimes, I felt this little chasm form inside me, like tectonic plates shifting around, and I asked myself  if this is what it’s like to be old.

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