I checked out the “two buck book sale” this weekend at the library, and, let me tell you, it was a fascinating glimpse into unabashed, naked greed. Secretly, that’s why I like going to the book sales. It’s not the books, although I can usually pick up a few decent things, it’s watching the other people at the book sales. I tell you what, I would love to see some psych graduate student do research on these things, because it’s truly amazing.

The book sales at the library follow a very strict format. Every few months, a book sale is announced, and it’s always scheduled to start at 10:00 on a Saturday. The books come from donations to the library, and the funds are used to support the library’s programs. Given that our library is pitifully underfunded and basically ignored by the county library system, every dollar really does count, so I get to feel like I’m helping out the library while picking up shamelessly cheap books. It’s pretty much a win-win.

So what happens is this: people start milling around outside the library at 9:45 or so, champing at the bit, and eventually the door to the community room is unlocked, and people surge in to look at books. I’m always reminded of the scene in Tempest-Tost when a man stipulates in his will that his books are to be given away to members of the clergy, and there’s a mob scene, with frantic priests shoving each other back and forth, battling over volumes, yanking beards, and pushing each other out of windows. When the scene is over, the house has been denuded of every scrap of printed material and the executors sit shell-shocked in the study. While the book sales don’t get quite that crazy, they definitely get a bit hairy.

You see, there are a couple of people in the community who make their living by selling used books, and these people go to the book sales specifically for the purpose of picking up books which they can then resell. Now, I don’t have a problem with this, on principle, I mean everyone has to make a living, but they are generally quite rude and rather nasty. I’ve had books snatched out of my hands, for example, and once I thought a large pile of books next to one of the tables was part of the sale, only to have a nasty little man descend upon me, snarling “that’s mine! THOSE ARE MINE! YOU CAN’T HAVE THOSE!”

And then there are little old ladies, who dodder harmlessly between the rows, buffeted as the book poachers (as I call them) zoom back and forth, snatching up volumes at lightning speed, and library volunteers drift about, attempting to straighten things and keep people in order. I tend to see the same people at every sale, each with their own specific tastes, ranging from the people who thrive on mass paperbacks to the types who descend on the multiple copies of Angela’s Ashes and those sorts of books and then swoop off with them in delight. (And if you think I’m kidding, I counted five copies of Angela’s Ashes and three of ’tis at the book sale.) Then there are a few people who are genuinely just there to browse and pick up a few interesting books, like me, although I notice that I am generally the only one under about 40 at the book sales. But maybe that’s because I always arrive early. (Not, I should note, out of a deep need to be inside first, but because I am pathologically early to everything, and also when you get up at 6:00 in the morning, as I seem to be doing lately, you get pretty bored and restless by 10:00.)

While I’m normally a pretty fractious and temperamental person, something about the book sales puts me in a sort of zen state. I can’t decide if I’m just in awe of the sheer, naked, horrifying capitalist lust which fills the hearts of the book poachers, or if I just don’t care that much. This used to happen to me at arena registration in college, too; I would stand in the middle of the room, bemused by the utter madness, and by the time I motivated myself into moving, all that would be left were classes like “The Sociopolitical Impact of Textile Dyes in Urban France, 1567-1643″ or “Calculus for Marine Biologists.” Perhaps I just become paralyzed by the actions of large, desperate crowds. Maybe this is why I get punched in the face by senators* when I go to protests, because I become too lethargic to move, let alone recognize danger.

At any rate, this weekend I was shocked to stroll up at 9:45 and find the door wide open.

This never happens. The door is always kept tightly sealed until 10:00 on the dot, guarded fiercely by a Friend of the Library while the line stirs restlessly outside and people try to act casual while pushing against each other and arguing in a loose sort of way about who arrived first. But no, the door was open and people were allowed to just sail in and stroll about, picking books out willy-nilly, so I did the same, only to discover that the book poachers had already picked the place clean.

This isn’t fair, I found myself thinking. I mean they say the thing starts at 10:00, if I’d known I could go in at 9:40, I would have been here earlier so that I could have gotten some books. It’s not fair that the damn book poachers get to go in and take whatever they like! There ought to be a limit! Or people at least ought to stick to schedule! I railed mentally at the injustice while I picked through the sorry remains of the once proudly-stocked tables. If I’d been into John Le Carre, Alan Furst, or Frank McCourt, it would have been a banner day for me.

I managed to find three books (one of which I had to ferociously retain while a book poacher looked on covetously), and I politely paid for them and ambled off, thinking about my tide of emotion surrounding the early opening. I was somewhat surprised, really, by how vehemently irritated I was, as the book sales usually create such a phlegmatic state that I sail along for several days afterwards in what other people might consider an almost good temper, for me, anyway.

It took me until Sunday morning to realize that I must be turning into one of them, the greedy, desperate book poachers, to get so riled up about the fact that they opened the door early. So they opened the door a little early? So what! Obviously I was just not meant to have any of the intriguing titles that the book poachers were squirreling away in their tottering stacks. Despite the allure of Artists and Warfare in the Renaissance and Better Mortuary Practice, Saturday was just not my day.

Just in case, though, next book sale, I am totally arriving at 9:30. It’s not that I want to get there first, you understand, it’s just that I like to be prepared for any eventuality. And I’ll be damned if I’m going to let one of those noxious book poachers get away with taking all the good books next time. They don’t even read them, for Pete’s sake, they just sell them in an orgy of capitalist desire instead of getting real jobs, and it’s just not fair, I tell you.

*You know you want to hear the story. Come on. I mean, who wouldn’t? Maybe if you ask very nicely, I’ll tell you.