Next time you pull up to a bookstore that sells “books and resources” to the politically radical, and find that it’s located next to “Sweeney Todd’s Salon,” be prepared for oddness. The sign saying “Open Daily: 11am to 9pm” will probably be more of an educated guess than a statement of fact, the implied message being “Well, you know, if we’re not busy doing something else — and we’ve got a lot going on.” And they do. They’re sorting and packing books for prisoners, running discussion groups about the G20, stopping the war in Iraq… The 200 or so square feet of book shelves are kind of an after-thought.

I didn’t know this, though. So I was a little confused to pull up at 11:30 and find the place dark. There were people inside, and the door was unlocked, but the people seemed pretty surprised when I actually entered.

“Are you open?” seemed like it should have been akin to a rhetorical question, but apparently not.

“No, not yet.”

“Do you know when you will be?”

“Usually we’re open by about now, but we’ll open when they get here. They’re volunteers, you know.”

I wondered who “they” were. The girl seemed to think I’d know. And since she was busy sorting and packing books, I thought I’d just return to my car and ponder the question from there, stopping first to retrieve my book from the trunk. I no longer trusted Them to appear soon, and yet I didn’t really feel like driving the hour back to my house now that I’d made it all the way here just to see what kinds of zines they’d carry.

A heavily tattooed couple clumped by in heavy black boots, their hair styles leaving it to the eye of the beholder to decide between “bed head” and “I spent hours moussing it to look just like this.” I wondered, as I often do, how piercings like the one woman had feel in -20 weather.

A preppy looking couple walked their black lab while sipping coffee. The lab peed on the bookstore’s sidewalk sign.

A middle-aged woman in grey sweats and lime green crocks shuffled along next to her miniscule grown daughter.  And then several minutes later walked back and entered the darkened bookstore.  Were these They? I closed my book and glanced at the clock: 12:10. Ten minutes after the store event I’d seen listed on the website was scheduled to begin.

But no. The lights didn’t turn on, so I returned to my book.

Not long afterwards, though, They arrived in the form of a diminuative college-aged guy carrying a satchel that was easily twice the size of his torso. The lights went on. A sandwich board went out on the sidewalk declaring “OPEN: 11am – 9pm.” And I went in to browse zines while They talked on the phone about an upcoming meeting to discuss “the war, abortion, and health care.”