I wanted to look sullen. FAIL.The Green Apple Core blog has been chugging along for six months now and barring any sudden reversal of fortune or tragedy, this is the first departure of one of our regular bloggers. Um, that's me. I'm leaving not only Green Apple, but San Francisco entirely at the end of the week. Rather than attempting a grand summation of what I have or haven't accomplished here, I'm going to let my Sunday night posts dissolve not with a bang but a whimper.
The picture above is that whimper, taken from a feature in the Chronicle on a light news day a few years ago. My smile belies my true feelings about being the center of attention of a photo shoot that took place in the store (complete with backdrop and professional photographer), but I am preemptively posting it in the fear that one of my co-workers may feel the urge to use it later on. (See this.) Yes, that's me. A baseball-playing playwright?
Well....
I can't entirely forsake the compulsion to sum up, but I'll keep it simple: of all the reasons to love Green Apple - the well-selected books, creaky stairs and labyrinthine second-floor being a few compelling examples - one stands above all others for me: the people. I have had the pleasure of working (and sometimes only "working," i.e., making "Book of the Month" commercials) with amazing, funny, and intelligent booksellers. It is because of them that I will miss this job and this city as much as I will.
I leave you with this quote from Alec Baldwin's character Jack on "30 Rock" (thanks for the reminder, Roman). It says all that I cannot:
"Lemon, there was once a great American called George Henderson. He met a woodland ape, or Sasquatch, and despite its dangerous message of environmentalism, became his friend. When the time came to do the hard thing and send it back into the forest where it belonged, and birds could perch on its shoulder because it was gentle, George Henderson summoned the strength and, by God, he did it. Did it hurt? You bet it hurt. Like a bastard. But he did it because it was the right thing to do. For the woodland ape. You think about that."
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4 comments:
Good luck with your next adventure, Stephen! The Richmond blogosphere will miss you. Great photo BTW :)
Oh and won't you spill before you take off. From your interview: "Before I got here, there was an already legendary "incident" in the poetry section that must remain mysterious and will go down in Green Apple lore."
Come on - now's the time to tell all! :)
It's pretty gross. You might never want to touch a Wordsworth book again.
I always think of it as Sparks' "Baptism by Fire", so to speak.
Good luck with everything! You should keep someone updated, to keep us updated, on you. :)
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