Sunday I tell Joe I have a great idea. What about breaking up the Biography section into subcategories? He gives the okay. I say I’ll come in Monday, a day off, and do it no problem. Figure it’ll take me a couple hours.

This is a section that takes up the entire wall of the back room, up to the ceiling. I decide to start with the A‘s and take anything that’s not to do with American history and politics, as a starting point. My whole aim with this project is to give literary bios their own section. Figure I’ll have that, world history, and America. No problem.

Within the first hour, half the table is filled with teetering stacks and it’s clear that there needs to be a memoir section, maybe a sports one too. Also: there are many actor, artist, musician, and trash celebrity bios that don’t fit into my scheme and will have to be moved to other parts of the store.

Joe comes back to check on my progress, scans the room, and stifles a laugh. The thing is that there’s no putting the toothpaste back in this tube. I can only keep going. He kindly sends out for gyros so I don’t keel over among my alphabet towers.

I text K I’m almost done about four hours in. I’m not almost done. The trouble and the thing I always forget when I undertake one of these reorgs is that there’s a lot of thinking and rethinking involved. It’s not just dumb labor. A good chunk of these books is sort of uncategorizable so I spend precious minutes staring off into space after scouring their back matter and publishing data. Still, I make progress. Now there’s a yawning gap in the middle of the wall. I’ve started some stacks here and there on the shelves temporarily as I’ve run out of room on the table and chairs.

Six hours in I finally make it to the Zs in my cull. America is all the way to the left now. Maybe we should rename this Fantasy. Whatever it is, I can start putting books back now. I decide to go back to front, starting with Literary Z‘s. It works, though I have to backtrack several times after shelving the wrong letter tower. The hazard of misalphebitizing never goes away, no matter how long I work here.

I pack up the pop, art, and film bios into boxes labeled “Dmitry’s little project” and make signs for the newly-created sections. What I thought would take two hours takes eight. I tell myself there was a reason to do this. That the madness will serve a purpose rather than just scratching an itch.

I have to believe that.

Happy to’ve contributed a cover for the inaugural issue of The Heckler—the magazine of revulsion & revolt. Print only. Contact pdesanex (at) proton (dot) me for yours.

In case you’re in the market for a stick-and-poke, I got a place.