Transit Priority: The Bookstore

On the bus or train, I usually have my head down studying my English notes or looking out the window listening to guitar tracks from Rodrigo y Gabriela.  But sometimes I like to look at the other riders.

Oftentimes, they're also head down, thumbs tapping away at the screen of their smartphones.  Most times their earphones are also plugged into their ears.  I see one middle-aged man rustling his newspaper as he flattens out the next page.  But he's just one.  

I'm not passing judgment, but does the conspicuous lack of books mean anything about this technological era?  Maybe those stories are all on iPads and Kindles.  And I guess there's nothing wrong with that, but I prefer holding books, returning back to the dog-eared page.  There's something reassuring in their weight, their physicality.

There is no bookstore in the Montebello Town Center.  There used to be a Borders.  That was the first store I would see as a kid when my dad would take us to the mall.  I loved browsing through the titles, randomly picking up a book and reading the first words.  That bookstore is gone now and I don't think there's another one within miles.  I know about the comic bookstore on Beverly, but I'm writing about bookstores like Barnes & Noble, not that I have anything against comics.  But this lack of bookstores, I wonder what that says about Montebello.