My favorite games are resource games. You have a few commodities and a few rules, and from this you build something or stop something, somehow maximizing resources to win. So games like Catan, Dominion, Ticket to Ride, Pandemic, etc. Pandemic is my favorite among favorites, a game that you can only win by pooling resources and abilities and collaborating with your fellow players. We’ve especially enjoyed the legacy versions which stretch scenarios out over a long-term. The choices you make in one round change the game board for the next, so what you build becomes quite elaborate. We’ve played the three Pandemic legacy games twice each and wish there were more!
Eleven years and five months ago, I was handed the keys to the Bryn Mawr College Bookshop. From the beginning, it’s seemed a lot like a live action resource game: a blank canvass on which I was being asked to build a viable campus bookshop. In 2015, it was somewhat unusual for a college to take back its store from a chain operator. But the challenge of reclaiming the space from the college’s failed fling with a chain was enormously appealing, as is much else about the lively, quirky and unique community I found at Bryn Mawr College.
This month, I’m turning in my keys. The retirement celebration is today. My last day is next week. The game isn’t over. We haven’t “won” yet. But it’s time for me to step away and leave others to play on.
It’s been a wild and wonderful ride. Two weeks after I started, I faced a crowd of alums back on campus for their reunion. With only a small amount of bad leftover merch from the chain, I knew they’d be unhappy with the quality and quantity of what we had to offer. So I put up an easel, a pad and markers at the front of the store and asked “what would you like to see in your independent BMC Bookshop?” Alums filled four big sheets with their ideas. Ever since, asking that question has been at the heart of how we’ve operated, and we will go to every length possible to do what the community asks of us.
Not surprisingly, I am especially proud of the fact that we’ve maintained a presence for books on this campus. If you follow college retail at all, you know there’s a strong tide that’s working against having physical books in college and university bookstores. A surprising number of people in higher education do not seem to understand the value and importance of books. But in our store, we stock over four hundred titles in physical book form for current semester classes. That’s down from pre-pandemic days, but it’s still a significant number of books. Plus we offer a small but lively selection of books outside the curriculum (current bestseller: R.F. Kuang’s TAIPEI STORY), and we do a brisk special order business because we can’t possible stock everything that this diverse community is looking for. Working on special orders and sourcing all the oddball titles that faculty want for their students — that’s the most fun I have on the job. Rebuilding the text section from scratch each semester is the game within the game, and I enjoy seeing how this plays out every time.
As much fun as the job can still be, serving as Director of the Bryn Mawr College Bookshop has also been exhausting. It’s been hard work and long hours and sometimes enormous frustration. Getting through covid disruptions was especially challenging, far beyond anything game designers would consider fair. Still, I’m grateful for the opportunity and for my time on this campus.
I don’t have a lot of plans for what’s next, except that I know I can’t stay ever really step away from books and the business of books. We’ll travel more than we’ve been able to. I’d like to learn how to cook better and to bake. (Over the past few months, we’ve watched/rewatched ALL of The Great British Baking Show from season one, episode one up through Nigella’s debut.). But I will remain close to books. I have some publishing projects to work on and, of course, lots to read.
I’m looking forward to the next game.