A Vignette:

The used book store is musty and old in its smell, intimidating in its vastness.  It’s one of my favorite places.  What other place in the world can Elizabeth Bennett, Aslan the lion, and Jean Valjean reside just an arm’s length away from one another? As I enter the store, older children in tow, I usher them to the kids section, and then head straight for the fiction section myself.  While in this place, enclosed within a veritable wall of literary cast-aways, I conjure my inner adventurer and smile. I know I will be contented.  The book titles converse with me; the covers present the tease. Shall I depart to a medieval castle and become the royal assassin’s apprentice, or shall I flee to an underground safe-haven to fall in love with a girl as we conceal ourselves from the terrible Third Reich?  The setting of the book store fades into opaqueness to make way for a new locale that exists within my imagination: a place where I am not myself yet more me than ever.  As I continue to leaf through, I recall my love for the literature that leaves me impervious to boredom, slaked in rich imagery, and wealthy of character.