By Joan Niesen

     

              “Good morning! Good afternoon! Whatever it is, hello! Oh, it’s afternoon and then some,” says Elizabeth Williams, a volunteer at the store, greeting a customer. Seated comfortably behind her desk, whose surface teems with worn notebooks, overfilled binders, yellow pencils, and an oversized calculator, Williams cares not about the number of customers in the store or even the time of day. However, time, increasingly, is an issue; as Williams and other aging volunteers try to share their love of books with the public, the notion of the traditional bookstore is slowly fading away.
            “We just don’t worry about the other things. I love books, and we’re here to sell books to people who love them,” says Williams.
            The Lantern, which is volunteer-run and acquires its books through donations, is a subsidiary of the Bryn Mawr Scholarship Fund, and its revenue goes to fund scholarships to Bryn Mawr College. The store was once one of seven Bryn Mawr bookstores on the East Coast, but in recent years four of the stores have closed, unable to face growing financial pressures. As its sister stores have slowly faded, The Lantern remains, a literary oasis for anyone in search of a good read.
            “To paraphrase The Wind in the Willows, there’s nothing as much fun as messing around in a good bookstore,” says volunteer Elizabeth Ridout.
            According to Williams, there’s a fine line between the store being “too cluttered” and “too organized.” The overflowing wooden shelves, upon which books are stacked both upright and on their sides, are a testament to her belief that a too-tidy bookstore will not feel inviting or welcoming. Williams wants customers to take out their reading glasses, rest on the stairs or lean against a shelf, and make themselves at home with the books.
            Despite their tendency towards disorganization, the volunteers know that some measure of order is necessary in the store, which is divided into sections like fiction, art, history, biography, geography, and foreign language. Picking through the seemingly endless stacks, customers and volunteers have unearthed such treasures as rare 1950s cookbooks and a Michelin travel guide to Japan that was autographed by John Wayne himself.
            “When I found it, I just imagined some tourist in the Tokyo airport who saw John Wayne and said ‘Can you give me your autograph?’” says Williams wistfully.
            Reminiscing about the sensation of running her fingers over the same pages that Wayne once touched, Williams makes it clear that the feeling of a book in her hands and the opportunity to pick through stacks, turn pages, and read excerpts is what makes her value the store. In a time where so many people buy books exclusively on the Internet, she hopes that the sensory experience of the store will keep customers coming back.
            “There’s a difference between having an idea, hearing about a book, and going on the computer to try and find it. That’s simply a different experience from coming in here,” says Williams.
            The Lantern exists in a world where time stands still, where computers are not yet integral to daily life and shopping for books is more about feeling and experiencing than pointing and clicking. Though the store has a website, few of the links are active, and no computerized inventory exists; according to Williams, they “have no idea what books are here.” The volunteers fall into two camps: those who “do” computers and those who “don’t,” and most belong to the latter group. As she enters purchases in a large white binder, meticulously marking prices and tax with her No. 2 pencil, Williams is a testament to the “if it ain’t broke, don’t fix it” mentality. Their system works, so why change?
            In fact, Williams insists that her handwritten records are superior to a digital approach. The volunteers are currently struggling with a broken printer, which, though a nuisance, hasn’t impeded the flow of business. Williams hasn’t a clue how to fix the machine; indeed, her only knowledge of the problem comes from scrawling notes in the tattered binder that volunteers use to communicate with one another from day to day.
            “There are long paragraphs about another volunteer trying to fix the printer and what she found in it: rubber bands, parts of sandwiches. It’s understandable why the printer stopped working,” says Williams.
            Despite the volunteers’ best efforts to keep the outside world at bay, reality, in the form of old age, has come knocking at 3241 P Street. With its mortgage paid a and strong base of steady, middle-aged customers, the store carries on its business just as it has each day for the last 31 years, but as its staff shrinks and grows older, The Lantern’s tenuous hold on the traditions of bookstores past weakens. Williams and Ridout, retirees themselves, field calls each week from elderly volunteers who are unable to work because they’re sick or even hospitalized. Though there are a few younger volunteers, most cannot devote much time to The Lantern, so most days there is no staff member in the store under age 65. As Williams looks around the store, she motions to a large pile of books that waits to be taken upstairs; many of the regular volunteers have trouble carrying loads from the basement to the second story.
            Sometimes, when the store’s front door opens, the outside commotion seems just a bit louder, and the once-dancing dust flecks must eventually settle into a thick film. The unshelved books are piling higher, yet The Lantern remains.
            “We are very lucky on many fronts, and I suppose that luck will just have to keep us going,” says Williams with a sigh.