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Ruralite Cafe

By Lisa Majors-Duff


There's nothing like a good page-turner

 By Lisa Majors-Duff News Editor
Though I have already been punished for the crime I am about to admit, I still feel the need to come clean. Maybe after I put all the sordid details in print I'll somehow feel absolved of my sin.

About three weeks ago I found myself in the Atlanta airport with some time to kill. Greg and I were finally taking advantage of our "free" cruise to the Bahamas. I use the term "free" loosely here because we all know you don't get anything for free, especially a trip on the "Fun Ship."

Anyway, we're in the Atlanta airport waiting for our flight to Orlando, and instead of hanging around the gate area, we opted to find bagels and coffee in the terminal. Of all the airports I've ever been in, which ain't many, Atlanta's terminal offers a nice variety of things to do, buy and eat. And since I had officially started my vacation at 10:30 p.m. the night before when I finally finished at the office, I didn't feel one bit bad about spending nearly $10 for a mid-morning snack.

But I'm straying from the crime story. After drinking some seriously strong coffee, I figured one more trip to the bathroom before boarding our flight would be a good idea. I have no fondness for airplane bathrooms. What's the old joke - I'm not claustrophobic, I just don't like small spaces.

So I slip into the ladies' room and play eeny-meeny-mimy-mo to pick a stall - the third one down on the right. It was here that I altered my modus operandi. I usually just head for the first one available on the left. But, like I said, I was on vacation and feeling frisky.

The next thing I know I'm staring down at the colorful cover of a paperback book on top of the toilet paper dispenser, right where I was going to put my purse. Needless to say, I was taken aback. What was that beautifully illustrated, obviously brand new book doing in my stall, I wondered? Was someone going to come back any second and look for it?

I sat down to.... well, ponder the possibilities. The book's owner could have at the very minute be making him or herself comfortable, his or her seatbelt properly fastened. (Then I remembered where I was and immediately eliminated half the world's population from the possible owners of the book.) She reaches into her carry-on bag, but her fingers do not touch the already familar cover of the book she purchased just to read on this long flight to LA or Seattle or Australia.

In a flash her seatmate is covered with the entire contents of her carry-on bag as she searches for a secret compartment the book might have found, but it's no use. She starts to think, "Did I pack it by accident? Where could I have left it?" By the time she figures it out, she and the other passengers of Flight 3024 to Los Angeles are being instructed to look to their right and left to see the Mississippi River below.

As soon as I picked up the book I knew why she felt so bad at leaving it behind. The cover, in addition to being beautifully illustrated and lettered, had a smooth, silky quality not found on most paperback books. It was a thick book, with more than 530 pages, but its weight was minimal. Not only did it feel good in my hands, it felt like it belonged there.

That was silly, I told myself. Of course it didn't belong to me. Any minute the owner would return and I'd ask, "Did you leave this here?" She'd say, "Yes, thank you for finding it," and I'd hand it back with little or no hestitation.

But that's not what happened. The owner did not return, though I waited a good seven or eight minutes. As I sat there, listening for the hurried footsteps, I began to invent reasons why I should keep the book. It was becoming obvious that no one was returning to claim it, which meant she was done with it. The "finders-keepers" theory, I figured. Maybe she'd just finished reading it and, as a commit-senseless-acts-of-kindness-type person, she left it behind for the next person to enjoy. That's just the thing a true book lover would do, I thought.

Not to mention that this was a book I knew I'd enjoy, especially since I really hadn't brought anything to read on this trip. I was going to the Bahamas aboard a Carnival Cruise Liner, not attending a literary conference, after all. Who needs books when there are casinos and Broadway-style shows and midnight buffets!

By the time I pulled the latch to leave the stall, the book was safely tucked in my purse so that if the owner had returned as I was leaving the ladies' room, she'd have no idea I had it. But again she did not return. As we passed through security, I knew the book belonged to me. And I happily read and enjoyed it on the flight to Orlando and on the ship when I needed a break from the fun.

My punishment came on the way home. I'd made it to page 128 when my sister picked us up at Port Canaveral. We threw our luggage in her trunk and headed for SeaWorld. By the time we got back to her apartment that night, I was ready to put my head on a pillow that wasn't moving to the rhythm of the sea. We told her good-bye the next morning when she went to work and we waited for our taxi to the airport. That's when I started looking for my book. I looked everywhere, emptying the contents of three suitcases on the livingroom floor. The taxi was due at any minute, and I couldn't find my book. "Where could I have left it?" I wondered, a feeling of dread creeping over me like the words of a bad country-western song. The real suffering set in back in Atlanta, when our two-hour layover turned into nearly four hours, and I didn't have anything to read! Oh, the agony.

On the up side, I'm happy to report that Jennifer found the book in the trunk of her car and mailed it to me last week. I'm enjoying all it has to offer and I'm making plans to leave it somewhere where I know it will be found and taken care of when I'm finished.

Back to Archive: 02/10/00.