Today is my 18th wedding anniversary. It’s really hard to believe. The hard to believe part is not that I can still be as in love today with my Bookman as I was when I married him, but that so much time has gone by. It seems like only yesterday. That really makes me sound old doesn’t it?

Our celebration today was appropriate for two people who love books. My Bookman came and picked me up from work a couple hours early and we went to Magers & Quinn, an independent bookstore we have never been to before but have heard good things about.

The bookstore is located in a part of Minneapolis called Uptown. If you know the area at all, then you know that Uptown is the hip part of town. It is where you find the quirky shops, a restaurant to suit every taste, and the art house theatres. It also has lots of cute apartments, townhouses, condos, and houses large and small. The area is so desirable that it costs a few dollars to live there. And so you have an interesting mix of young singles in tiny apartments, urban professionals, and two-income marrieds who either never had children or if they have, the children are grown up and on their own. Then of course there are all the people who don’t live there who are driving around trying to find a place to park. Uptown is very much an urban village and there are no parking garages or huge Walmart or Target-sized parking lots. After driving around for a bit we finally found a spot just a block away. It was really lucky.

Magers & Quinn turned out to be what a bookstore should be. It’s in an old building with low ceilings and weird angles. The bookshelves are tall and old and not always of the same shape and size. The fiction section starts in a back room and zigzags to the front room where it snakes around until it makes it to the end of the alphabet somewhere near the glass-fronted 1st edition and antique bookcases. New and used books are mixed in together and the used books are often so new looking you can’t tell they are used except for the price sticker.

There is a huge poetry section, a large section of literary criticism, and a large combined section of letters and essays. It was really overwhelming so it was hard to tell where to look. We left with Margaret Atwood’s Year of the Flood, a 2010 Hafiz wall calendar, Elaine Dundy’s Dud Avocado, and right by the register I spied a bookmark that had caricatures of Thoreau and Emerson on it. Had to have that!

We had entered the store a little grumpy about having to drive around to find parking and left in a great mood with intentions of going back sometime because it is worth the parking bother.

Then we went and had an early dinner at our favorite pizza place (they make delicious vegan pizzas). When we got home we went for a walk. Now we are snuggled in for the evening. It’s been a great way to celebrate our anniversary.