i went into a Barnes and Noble yesterday
and, as a friend stated,
it was unnaturally normal.

the stacks were all stacked,
sales, clean shelves, bright lights,
like they had just shut down regularly one night
and opened the next day with everyone wearing masks.

and i bought too many books
(potentially to make up for my spouse not being there;
our usual date night: book shopping)
and we still had our membership active
(as if the last year and a half on pause hadn’t even happened)