Times are changing

Last summer I blogged about the closing of Borders and my memories of the Pasadena store as a place I enjoyed going to. Not only did I find good coffee and good conversation but two of my friends as community relations directors brought in off-beat bands that offered alternative music. Now another yet harder blow; the Bodhi Tree bookstore in West Hollywood my home away from home since 1979, has closed its’ doors.  

There was no other place like it and for decades it served as a world-renowned spiritual mecca for seekers of all persuasions — including Ringo Starr, Governor Jerry Brown, and actress Shirley MacLaine, who chronicled how her metaphysical journey began at the Bodhi Tree in her memoir, Out on a Limb.

To me, the bookstore represented a repository in the likes of the Library of Alexandria, http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Library_of_Alexandria

gathering all of the world’s ancient wisdom traditions.  And like many of my haunts, it was a place where I could go spontaneously on my own and I’d find unexpected intellectually stimulating dialogue.

I thought of the owners whom I knew personally and they told me they were optimistic that the bookstore would be reborn at a different location just outside of the city and are in negotiations with a potential buyer for its name, website and database.

Still, I shall feel its loss.  Gone are the available good karma pennies, the burning incense and the enjoyable herbal tea you could help yourself to, but most of all I will miss the wonderful books I came across as only one can find in an independent bookstore.  It symbolized an inhalation of fresh air as one of the starting places where my interest in spirituality blossomed.  Not only am I sad to see it go, but I also recognize that esoteric books have been replaced by more mainstream material as entrepreneurs enter the field of books wiping out knowledge in favor of materialism.  

But all has not vanished; named after the place where the Buddha is said to have attained enlightenment, it may still  — ‘Rise from the ashes of a Phoenix.’