Open For Business — Confessions of a Used Record Dealer in New England

by Scott Seward

I never miss Connecticut. Does anyone ever really miss Connecticut? They might miss the pizza of Connecticut. It’s definitely worth missing. Or they might miss a favorite lake in Connecticut. Or the sound of the gulls and the smells of the Long Island Sound shoreline. Which is actually a much better smell than you might imagine. It’s a good honest ocean and seaweed smell. If you close your eyes you might even think you are on Martha’s Vineyard when you are on a beach in Guilford or Madison. Do people miss Kent Falls? Gillette Castle? Pilobolus? The, uh, Danbury Fair Mall? Has anyone ever said: “I’ll never forget that summer I spent in Hartford. I really miss it there.” Never. Never ever. Newport? Yes. Providence? Yes. Even Boston? Yes. Memories were made in those places. There were never any memories made in Hartford. It’s possibly a great place to be if you want to forget what life is or what life could be. I don’t miss the hundreds of pounds of bluefish inside my grandparents’ basement freezer in New Milford. I don’t miss the odor of boiling mushrooms in their kitchen. The constant canning. Getting ready for the next great Depression. The burlap sacks of fish heads buried under the tomato plants out back. Wait: I do miss watching Joan Joyce pitch softball. What a sight to see. She might be the single greatest thing to come out of the state. Former Connecticut Governor Ella Grasso looked like she could have played shortstop on Joan’s team. I always liked that about the Governor. The Connecticut state insect is the praying mantis. I always figured that was because it was the bug that most resembled an insurance salesman.

I think of the state because I think of how long it’s been since I last visited my sister’s grave there. A sold-out cemetery in a haunted corner by the water, my sister was actually the last person to get a patch of grass to call her own. I am ambivalent about graves. And what is under them. I wasn’t raised with grave fear or grave worship. I have no opinions about the care and display of bodies. About what to do with them when they are cold. If I walk into a funeral and there is an open casket my reaction is always: “Why do people do that? That’s not the person. I think I’ll sit all the way in the back. I don’t want to look at that. I used to talk to that.” But then I remember that it’s an ancient thing. Rites. Rituals. All that jazz. It makes me appreciate my own family’s lapsed Unitarianism and general art worship. You don’t need to prop art up on an altar. You CAN, of course. Plenty of people do. But art is already so strong and sturdy. It outlives generations. It won’t rot unless it sucks.

A part of me wants to take my father to my sister. One last time? He’s 88. A part of me wants to be there with him. I don’t know why. Part of me wants to forget the whole thing. I have too many parts. It should be a simple idea. A no-brainer as they say. But I fret over it. Will it make him too sad? His parents are right next to my sister. Would it be like rubbing his nose in death? He’s 88. It bears repeating. I don’t know. We’ll see what he says. It might be nice to see his old stomping grounds. Not the cemetery. The town surrounding it. His people are from there. He spent his summers there as a kid. So did I. Maybe that’s reason enough to go. It’s only a couple of hours away. Why do I make simple things hard? When have I ever not made an easy thing harder?

The day has been long and slow. Perfect conditions to think about death and Connecticut. My nice little store is quiet and dusty. That’s what people say to me when they come in and can’t think of anything else to say: “Nice little store you have here.” It can never be a nice store. It always has to be little. Nobody wants me to forget how small my store is. I’m never going to forget! I would have made it larger but I ran out of room. Or people will say: “This place is dangerous. I could spend HOURS in here.” Average time that the person saying that spends in the store: 4 minutes. Average amount that they spend: $0. I enjoy the old chestnut: “What time do you close? 5:00? I’ll have to come back. I have to go to a hernia operation/fox hunt/etc. but I’ll come back after that.” And they are never heard from again. I understand. People just feel the need to say something. I would cry with joy if someone ever said: “I’m leaving now without buying anything and I am never coming back.” When I leave a store I tend to say “Thanks!” as I head for the door. And then I leave and never come back. Seems about right. If you are ever in a store try not to do this: *scan store with dubious look on face* and say: “So, how’s business?” *take one more dubious glance before heading for the door* and say: “Well, good luck!” Because everyone running a store everywhere will want to say to you: “How’s business? It would be a lot better if you ever bought anything. How’s your MOM’S ASS? I heard it’s very large but suffering staffing problems and supply chain issues.” Which makes no sense, but it’s what we are all thinking. Or something to that effect.

I realize it is a tired cliche to complain about baby boomers, but they are truly my cross to bear. I LIKE old people. Genuinely OLD people. But the boomers who assail me are not old. They are somewhere in between toddlerhood and old age. These are white people I am talking about. American white people. I live in a very white part of a mostly white state. The boomers I’m thinking of are not working class. They are mid to upper middle class. Educated. “Progressive”, whatever that means. The way that they react to and talk about rap music makes me question any and all notions of progression. Any radicalism they may have contained during their big chill years has been sucked completely out of them. Their skin is soft and untouched. They are limp and appear benign. There is a false twinkle to them. False Santa Claus bemusement. Wait, no, false Santa Claus cheer and genuine bemusement. They are bemused by just about everything that regular people do. It’s as if they can’t believe that people still do things. They are never as funny or as clever as they think they are. They love to catch you out. Make you explain yourself. Your business. And then dismiss any explanation with a smug and bemused smile. They never listen. They can talk about the past forever which is an easy indicator that their present isn’t worth talking about. That the past is what they have. I’m going to miss the people who were born in the 30s and before. Their past was history to me. When they were idiots, it was a historical idiocy. Like they were talking to me from a Sinclair Lewis novel or a Ring Lardner story. Everything that the boomers talk about is the same stuff that they’ve been talking about — and in the same way with the same language — for 50 years. You can see them stumbling into traffic outside my store. To get to the bakery on the other side. Like unwell chickens. No care about traffic. No concern that there is an actual crosswalk 30 feet away. They cross where they like. They make cars stop for them. 90% of the people who do this all day (I get bored…) have white hair. But they aren’t old.

I had two opposite boomer experiences today at the store. Look, I sell used records. I realize that by doing so, I am setting myself up for boomer grief. Their whole life is an LSD-soaked episode of Happy Days with an Eric Clapton soundtrack. I tried to create a horrifying image there. I think that will do. They have been nostalgic for capitalist entertainment since they were children clutching their Howdy Doody dolls. Anyway, this guy comes in with his wife and he’s someone I have already been leery of because he comes to town once a year in the summer and EVERY year he tells me how many records he has and how he should really sell them all. I’m used to this. It’s called the Boomer Tease. People threaten to sell their collections full of “rare” “gems” that are “near mint” and they do this for years. If I ever do get any of their stuff it’s almost always littered with beat up Jackson Browne records covered in cat fur from a cat that died decades ago. Even the animal fur on their records is nostalgic. So I wasn’t exactly thrilled to see this guy. But he brought me some records this time! And they weren’t all horrible! I even kept one for myself. (Stereo 1968 pressing of Andrew Hill’s 1967 album Compulsion. A very clean copy. It’s from the time when Liberty Records owned Blue Note. I have no problem with Liberty pressings of Blue Note albums. They sound fine. I was happy to have it walk through my door and it made me like this guy even more!) He was nice. His wife was nice. She was from Connecticut! Of all places. She even knew my kindergarten teacher. My kindergarten teacher was a pip. Let me tell you. I gave him decent money. Rewarding him for bringing me some old blues records. Always in boomer demand. Boomers prefer their black pain to come from a historical distance. New pain is too new. It doesn’t have that same lived-in feel. We had a nice chat. This guy and his wife and me. He had played music with Joey Spampinato! Or maybe it was Johnny Spampinato. Good either way. I always enjoy talking with someone who enjoys the Travis, Shook And The Club Wow album as much as I do. To be fair, he was on the young end of boomer. Closer to the Foghat Generation that is technically Gen X but that is lost in its own haze of clove cigarettes and Rock & Rye. Anyone who came of age in the 70s is okay with me. Though this guy might have been a bit older than that.

His opposite came in next. A jaywalking mook if I ever saw one. They all tend to blend together into one shock of blindingly white hair and unhealthy-looking golf club tan.He says “Would you like to buy 900 records?” I immediately say: “Sure. How much do you want for them?” This stops him mid-smirk. For some reason people seem to think that 900 records is a lot of records. The 200 I had just bought would be cleaned, priced, bagged, and be out in the store by the end of the day. Most of them would be gone in a week. Volume should never be a problem for a second-hand store. If it is, that’s just a result of the usual lethargy, ennui, entropy, and depression to be found in diagnosed and undiagnosed hoarder/collector store owners. He says, “So, how does this work when you buy stuff?” “Do you plug into some database or something…” And I said, “Yes, I am a robot and I plug into my database.” And I said it in the voice of a robot! He was not amused. I didn’t care. My dad was with me and I’d rather talk to my dad about ANYTHING than talk to this mook. He already looked completely out of his element, and I was happy about that. He basically wanted what ALL these indistinguishable dipshits want: He wanted to know exactly how much money I would give him for records I hadn’t seen. No pictures, no lists, no nothing. He just wanted me to work my magic. He had no intention of selling anything but he wanted me to know that he had what I so desperately wanted, and he wanted to waste my time and then leave forever. And here’s the kicker: He starts to tell me what he has and he says: “A lot of the records are jazz, BUT THOSE AREN’T FOR SALE….the rest is classical, pop…” It just got more tempting by the minute. The majority of his alleged 900 records weren’t for sale and the rest sounded…less than exciting. I could smell the dead cat from where I was standing. I tell this guy and all the guys like him — and they are always guys — that all he has to do is bring some records in and I can give him an idea of what I can buy them for…and it’s like I’m speaking Esperanto. They don’t even hear me. They only want to be told that they are sitting on a goldmine and they want me to be completely floored that they allegedly own records. In a record store! Fuck that guy. These guys. They really are the pits. Are classical fans annoying? Of course they are. They never want to pay for anything and they only want one thing and that thing is something that nobody has. And they look at every record for hours and never spend a dime. Same goes for 78 collectors. 45 collectors can be this bad, but mostly they are so shell-shocked by their own OCD that you forget that they are still in the store on their hands and knees looking through boxes of singles that you don’t even remember you had. But these boomer collection trolls…they really take the cake. They want to ruin your day. They truly do. They want to make you feel like shit and smirk at your store and I am really only still alive because it is my solemn vow to outlive every last one of these motherfuckers.

I feel bad for their kids. How many times have they had to listen to The Band over the years? There oughta be a law. And those kids should know: their parents will never die. Boomers are hoping to live to be 145 years old. And that’s a conservative number as far as they’re concerned. How would earth be able to get along without them? Who would listen to all the toothless 21st century folk rock? They will be scouring Mars for revolutionary microbes that completely do away with erectile dysfunction. They will be growing hearts in jars in the same greenhouses used to grow their impossibly strong weed gummies. When the father of a boomer died it was with a Lucky Strike in one hand and a snow shovel in the other. At the age of 60. Maybe 65. After years of working 4 jobs to pay for the boomer’s graduate school education or to pay off the authorities in India after that drug bust in ’72. The mothers of boomers lived longer because they were indestructible warriors of the Depression era and started life selling turnips on the side of the road in Minsk before their family made a mad dash for Duluth or Cincinnati.

I just needed to get that out of my system. I do get angry when I see people who grew up with so much in a country with so much room and so many natural resources and they never even had to compete against women or people of color or queer people because they owned EVERYTHING and everyone had to follow their crappy lead in a quest to survive and they acted so churlish and petty and at best showed a begrudging noblesse oblige despite their wealth and opportunities and their total control of the narrative via ownership of ALL media. They even invented the terms and descriptions of phony generations like boomer, x, millennial, etc., and the terms and descriptions were only really invented to describe white people with money. Money they could take when the marketing of identity proved so successful. Your love of every brand sold to you tenfold. Scooby Doo and The Love Boat ARE who you are, Gen X. Star Wars shoved so far down people’s throats that they can’t breathe and then they pay double for the pleasure of suffocation.

*Someone just brought their goddamn dog into my store without even asking if it was okay.* Don’t walk in and let your pooch run riot. I don’t know where your friggin’ dog has been. My store is near Vermont. That about sums it up. For the record: I don’t want to pet your dog. Why do people want other people to love their dogs so much? They’re just hoping you are a dog person. Dogs are fine. I like them outside where they belong. If they go to the bathroom in my store they are in big trouble. Also, some people are deathly afraid of dogs. These people never care or think about that. I can’t even imagine bringing a dog into a store. It is so outside the realm of possibility to me. It just seems like the height of…entitlement? Obliviousness? I don’t know. I just end up getting used to these things. I don’t have it in me to tell people that I don’t want their dumb dog in my store. The thing is, people who do this never buy anything. They’re walking their dog! They aren’t shopping. They’re bored. It’s the same as when people bring babies in. They are dying of boredom. I get it. I lived it a lifetime ago. So I let the stupid dog run around. The baby cries. I give them a place to be. To break up the tedium of ownership. I can’t fake amusement though.

Wait, that’s not true. I have worked in public for decades. In positions of servitude. I can fake any emotion. I’m really good at faking it. I’m like Christopher Walken in that movie Who Am I This Time? You ever see it? T.V. movie from the early 80s. Jonathan Demme directed it. Susan Sarandon. It was from a Vonnegut story. Christopher Walken does local theater and he’s really good at embodying a character. Off-stage he’s basically a catatonic dullard. That’s me. I worked in corner stores in Philly for years. I would mimic whoever I was talking to. I still do it now. It makes life easier. I can pretend to care about anything. I’ll even try to mirror vocal patterns. Accents. I don’t think about it. I don’t PRIDE myself on it. I’m not trying to be some sociological master of disguise. It just relaxes people and therefore I feel it is less likely that they will kill me. It doesn’t work with Russians though. They always look like they are ready to kill you. There is no strategy for them other than blatant rudeness. I’m talking about actual record and CD dealers from Russia. Not, like, ballerinas or something. I had these guys from Siberia in the store once…anyway, they can be rough stuff. I don’t have time for rough. Mostly I just drape my beefy frame in Carhartt and hope for the best.

It’s a different story when it comes to people who need more immediate attention. I talk to people inside and outside of my store on a fairly regular basis who are mentally ill and/or addicted to drugs and/or depressed and/or desperate and/or chronically ill, and/or dying of terminal diseases and I do the best I can to tread lightly. And I use humor. And empathy. And I use all the experience I have and all the things I have learned talking to similar people at my many past sidewalk-level jobs. And I try not to fall into psychic booby traps because I have my own stuff to worry about and my own people to care for and I need all the energy I can get. I know how to handle these situations pretty good by now.. But if I ever seem out of sorts or frazzled, it isn’t you. I might have just got an earful from someone. Or three someones. I can be a good listener. Sometimes people just want that. I can almost always do that much for them. Listen. I would say that’s the least I can do, but sometimes I feel like I got whacked in the head by some really sad shit and all I was doing was standing there cleaning some records. It comes with the territory.