Shopgirl

I’ve discovered that I have a Kathleen Kelly complex. It’s undeniable. Whenever August rolls around and the first “back to school” commercial airs, I have a sudden urge to have my life mirror Kathleen Kelly’s. Kathleen Kelly of the little bookstore. I start checking my email in hopes that some mysterious friend wants to send me bouquets of sharpened pencils, if he knew my address. I find myself wanting to buy school supplies and wandering around the back to school section at Target wondering if they still make Trapper Keepers and imagining what folders I’d pick out if I were returning to school. I have an urge to buy twinkle lights to make life more enchanting. I make random stops at Barnes & Noble to just browse the aisles and end up in the children’s section recalling my favorite stories from childhood, although I’m sad to say I have yet to read the “shoe books.” I long for fall and feel inspired to make time to start reading more.

The last time I was at Barnes & Noble I started thinking about my favorite “chapter books” from growing up. Some I saw on the shelves and silently hoped other children would pick them out and fall in love with the same characters that I did. Others were missing from the shelves, but I’m sure they would be on the shelves at The Shop Around the Corner (even if the big bad chain store doesn't carry them).

Here are a few that came to mind:
** Charlotte’s Web (I distinctly remember picking this book up off a bright red cart during a book fair at school)
** The Sadie Rose Series & Elizabeth Gail Series (both which my dad read aloud to me before bed each night)
** The Babysitters Club Series (who could forget Kristy, Mary Ann, Claudia, Stacey, Dawn, and the junior associates like Mallory and Jessie)
** Ramona Quimby, Age 8 (I bought this one for Hadley last year to do my part to keep Ramona alive)
** Anastasia Krupknick (a book in another great Lois Lowry series)
** From the Mixed Up Files of Mrs. Basil E. Frankweiler (who could forget the puppet show Abby, Amy Johansen and I did for our 6th grade reading project...Abby and I probably still has burn marks from trying to use the hot glue gun to give our sock puppets a head full of yarn)
** And the pen pal series that I don’t remember the name of but they each had their own set of stationary and secret “mailbox” their other 3 friends would leave them notes on

I daydream that someday I’ll own my own cute little children’s bookstore where my daughter and I can twirl. I know Fox Books put the Shop Around the Corner out of business, but the Kathleen Kelly in me believes that it could happen. And until then I’ll spend this fall reading some of the books I’ve been wanting to read for weeks, buy my new fall candle and maybe just one roll of scotch tape at Target, and who knows I may even add the shoe books to my stack of books to read. It really is too bad Skating Shoes is out of print.