We opened the newly renovated Ten Pound Island/Flatrocks Gallery building in 2008.
Sadly, my Jackass neighbor’s tree destroyed the building in 2010.
Mr. Jackass denied any responsibility and did everything in his power to prevent us from reopening. But we forged on. We took the insurance money, borrowed everything we were worth, and built the new Flatrocks Gallery building.
It was a beautiful space, and we had great shows and parties there,
but we didn’t make enough money at it. Cynthia and Anne Marie, co-gallerists, shut it down in 2018.
Anne Marie redesigned the second floor of the building, which had been rental studios for artists, into living quarters for the two of us. The Gallery downstairs filled with rare books,
and one of the former artist’s studios became my office.
*****
Now, here’s the thing…
Our gallery space has ten-foot ceilings,
which makes for a long flight of stairs to the second floor.
When you add in the stairs to the fully moisture-proofed basement,
home of the cheap books (also known as the Vault of the Unrare),
you have a total of 33 steps, each with an 8 inch riser, for a vertical ascent of 22 feet.
While all this was in the planning stage, almost everyone told us that living on the second floor was a bad idea for a couple in their mid seventies and early eighties. Dreams of heart attacks and headlong tumbles danced in their heads. Our grandchildren fretted about having to care for invalids with broken hips.
But Anne Marie and I wondered how geezerish couples had survived living on second floors in the 1800s, before we invented elevators and got so damned smart about what old people needed to stay safe and live long lives?
Or maybe that was why lifespans were shorter back then. Too many stairs!
Anyway, after six years it seems to be working out pretty well. Anne Marie makes about ten trips a day, or almost 400 steps from the second floor to street level and back. (She’s got one of those step counters on her phone but it doesn’t factor in gravity and weight.) I make at least thirty trips a day between the Rare Book Dept. in my office on the second floor, and the Vault of the Unrare way down in the basement, for a total of 1300+ feet.
When we first moved to our new quarters, I weighed in at just under 200 pounds. This morning the scale read 161.
So, if it hadn’t been for that Jackass neighbor…
Vault of the Unrare = Tomb of Tomes…
Now I don’t feel so bad about the 12 steps I have to negotiate to get to the book “loft.” However, the trip makes the books feel more rare than they actually are.