random thoughts – Day 1,327 – (Saturday) – author talk

There were a few interesting events I saw listed for today. The problem was, I saw them earlier in the week and couldn't remember what they were. There seems to be a move away from using Facebook Events, which are easy to track and receive reminders about. The new tendency seems to be straight Facebook posts which can be liked, but after that, they are hard to find again later. Newspaper notices are even worse.

Today I remembered there was something to do with an author at LaLa Books but then I couldn’t remember if it was today or tomorrow. It took a bit of digging and hunting in Facebook and on the store's website to finally find the information and confirm the time. 

The event was an author’s talk and reading with Charlie Gargiulo, author of Legends of Little Canada at 1:30. I managed to hunt down the info in time to attend the event and arrived downtown with enough time to visit nearby Gallery Z which had many tempting artworks at affordable prices but for which I lack suitable wall space. 

Author Charlie Garguilo
at LaLa Books.

The talk was interesting and I’m glad I made it there. Written in the voice of an 11-year-old boy, the book is about the Little Canada neighborhood of Lowell and Charlie’s own experiences with the discomfort of moving to a new city at age 11 and after forming friendships in the neighborhood, seeing his friends disappear one by one as the families were displaced under urban revitalization. I can relate to the personal upheaval of moving at that age, and growing up in Fitchburg gives me an appreciation of the the ethnic neighborhoods of a mill town. 

I bought a copy of the book and was able to read the first two blissfully short chapters while standing in line to have the book signed by the author. There was once a time that I thought by this point in life I'd be reading from and signing my own books at events. I vaguely remember the me that used to have a spark and the occasional dream. 

A friend was also at the reading, and afterward we stopped in at Ayer Lofts Art Gallery. There was a show of pen and ink drawings of local architecture. The detail in this artist’s work is always impressive, and many of the pieces were tagged with the coveted red dot that signifies “sold.”

There was no solid plan after the author’s talk. Heck, there was no solid plan before the talk and it was a miracle I made it out of the house at all. It's easy to get sucked into Facebook, Netflix, and stupid phone games and suddenly hours have escaped.

While sitting in the car in the bank parking lot a block from the book store, options were considered. More downtown art galleries? St Vincent de Paul Thrift Shop? There is always Market Basket, one of my most popular default activities.

When I arrived at the street near home that leads to St. Vincent, the turn was taken. Along the way, I remembered it was open house Saturday at Western Avenue Studios. I was in the wrong lane to make the left turn, so I proceeded straight as recently planned and went to the thrift shop.

At St. Vincent’s, I bought a glass candle holder, a glass tree, and a metal heart painted in aqua that seemed like it would work in the kitchen. Luckily, there were no sweaters or clothing that caught my eye. Sadly, there were none of the elusive style of soup bowls I’ve been seeking for years. Leaving the shop, the decision was made to skip the studio open house, skip Market Basket, and just go home.

At the house, while scrolling through Facebook, I saw photos from one of the other events that flirted around the periphery of my memory this morning which never made it past “I think there was something happening this morning, but what?” It was a guided walk through a historic cemetery in Leominster, led by a local author and historian. Crap.