Our office building management has regular “fun” activities - a costume contest at Halloween, an ice cream social in August, that kind of thing. Best of all, though, are the book fairs.
Twice since we’ve moved in, they’ve filled the lobby with books for sale at ridiculous prices (70-80% off) - everything from the predictable technical books to biographies, romances and Clifford the Big Red Dog. It reminds me of nothing so much as the much-anticipated Scholastic book fairs we had in elementary school, when I would get to take a few dollars to school and buy books.
I remember how endless the possibilities seemed. I had all this money - maybe a whole five dollars - and I could spend it all on books—any books I wanted. It was like going to the library, only better, because I could keep these books. I’d be able to take them home and put my little Ex Libris bookplates in the front and write my name in them and they would be mine. I didn’t have to wait for Christmas or my birthday, they would be mine today. (And they’d be read and re-read before the week was out, typically.)
I loved book fair days with a passion that has apparently never quite died, because when I pulled into the parking garage this morning and saw the balloons and the big “Book Fair Today” banner, I felt that still-familiar little jolt of excitement, even though I can - and do - buy myself pretty much any book I want, whenever I want to. Today is special; it’s Book Fair Day.