Dad, books, Starbucks, and Americans

One of things that joined Dad and me was a love of reading. We'd share books and not infrequently buy the same one and end up bringing it to share and get the "nope, read it!" response.

So one of the less obvious ways I miss him is literature. Dad didn't have a great love of America (I often told him, "I don't like Americans either Dad; but then again, I've not met one I didn't like". And that's true, the global image of the 300lb yank in bermuda shorts and hawai'ian shirt failing to comprehend a foreign language and foreign currency is stereotypically wrong, but out there.

Dad also deplored the rise and rise of the "Mall". Here in Lexington the area of Hamburg seems to be one extended Mall over a few square miles. But there is a Barnes and Noble. Big corp they may be, but it's also a temple to the printed word (and of course there are others - bigger or better - to be found). B&N have been holding events this week to encourage schoolkids to buy books and get into reading, and that's a wonderful gift, if accepted.

And finally Dad intensely disliked Starbucks' inability just to serve him a simple coffee.

So as I'm sitting in the Starbucks franchise at Barnes and Noble in Lexington, Kentucky; that gives me a lot to think about.

Although Dad never came this way, I think (in the end) he'd have liked this place; and knowing that simultaneously gives me pleasure; and sadness for all the books we won't share anymore...