[editor’s note] We have a new bookseller aboard. Bob Lewis comes to us from Ontario, Canada and will be adding his views and experiences to our site, thanks for sharing your bio here Bob.
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I spent my first 8 years in England near Codicote – a village founded by the Romans just north of London. When I was 8 the lady next door taught me to read – took her about 6 weeks – Mrs. Batts, a retired school teacher – I’ll be grateful to her forever.
That was in ’56, just before we moved to Canada. For this (among other things) I’ll be grateful to my parents forever.
In 63 I got interested in world politics, environment and religion, proceeded to get very depressed, quit school and spent the next few years working on farms (Peace River), in factories, logging camps, (Queen Charlotte Islands) etc. Reading all the while, of course. Huxley’s ‘Doors of Perception’ inspired me to look into the 60’s drug culture which introduced me to Eastern thought, broke me of seeing the world from a strictly ‘logical’ perspective, and enriched my life immeasurably.
In ’83 my partner and I bought a country general store on a summer tourist route in a little hamlet called Sylvan in southern Ontario – maybe 25 people. We did well for a while, followed by a 5 year period during which our road was closed for the better part of 4 summers. We closed the store and it slowly filled up with ‘stuff’.
Meanwhile, a friend (Scott Davidson) and I had started a weekly newspaper. We did that for about 2 years. The paper was extremely well received but neither of us was any good at selling ads, which is where the money is. We used to fantasize about winning the lottery and not having ads. Since neither of us bought tickets, that didn’t happen. We never made any money, and eventually had to give it up.