When Grief Does the Buying

The day Mum died back in September we all sat around, more or less happy that she’d gone how she wanted, more or less numb. We all repaired back to my sister’s after a few hours and I took myself off up the hill to Sherman’s, her local independent bookstore.

There is something so comforting, so open yet enclosed, about a bookstore. Like a mother’s arms. I picked up a copy of Birds of Maine by Michael Deforge and Lynda Barry’s Syllabus from the graphic novel section. Not sure why these books — I just wanted to have something to mark the day, and to thank the bookstore for being there for me.

I’m only now getting to grips with the Deforge, and it is a tour de force. Silly, profound, mundane, bickeringly observed. Daft. I’m going to write a letter to him, it still being International Letter Writing Month, telling him I picked up his tome and thanking him for helping to make sense of a world that doesn’t have a lot of sense in it.