Indigo III: My secret country.

 

 “Most of us, I suppose, have a secret country but for most of us it is only an imaginary country. Edmund and Lucy were luckier than other people in that respect.”

C.S. Lewis, The Voyage of the Dawn Treader 

Having tried two different routes to replacing my Narnia books at Indigo, I shrugged my shoulders and moved on - life is short, and there's always something else to worry about.  In my case, it was apartment hunting.

Karli and I live in an older three-story walkup, and whereas we're in a great neighbourhood which is located within easy walking distance of the ocean, the building itself leaves something to be desired.  As such, we've been looking at other residential options in the greater Vancouver region. Having found an interesting option on Craigslist™ earlier this week, we made an appointment for noon Saturday.

A couple of days later, Karli pointed out to me that she'd done a search on the Indigo™ site, and the missing books from the local branch's Narnia selection were available at their Metrotown location.*

"Thank you, love, but that's a bit of a trip just to make up a set of books. It's really not that big a deal."

She replied, "Yes, but we're going to be right near there on Saturday looking at an apartment." 

Bingo.

We looked at the apartment this morning (which we ended up not applying for - great apartment, wrong location for us) and then made our way to the nearby Indigo/Chapters store.  Karli managed to find the single copy of The Lion, The Witch and the Wardrobe that they had in stock* (located on the regular inventory rather than the $6 book table) and I found all but two of the other books, two which had been well stocked at the other store.

As it turned out, the books were not only on sale at six dollars each, but three for ten dollars, and a friendly checkout clerk very kindly pro-rated my five books so that the entire stack only cost me seventeen dollars.  (Thereby redeeming Indigo's reputation more than a little.) A quick lunch, then back to our local store, where I was able to purchase the remaining two books (and a copy of Tarzan of the Apes to legitimately qualify for the 3 for $10 pricing.)

Skimming through the books, I felt a strong sense of nostalgic pleasure. Narnia was my first introduction to fantasy - my first secret country, to quote C.S. Lewis - and in spite of all of the competition that it's had over the decades, it still holds a special place in my heart.  I'm going to add my seven new copies to my 2018 Resolution reading list - I've re-read them many, many times over the years, but it's always a pleasure to visit a place that I think of as my home.

  - Sid

* This is exactly the sort of thing that makes Karli such a treasure as a companion.