The shop “Beautiful Things" had been a fixture on Sycamore
for as long as anyone could remember and was one of those old fashioned anchors
that fix time in a fast changing neighborhood. The street on which the store
stood actually was not called Sycamore but merely had a number; these nondescript numerals however did no justice to the long rows of large trees with
peeling barks that lined the sidewalk, so I decided to change the name. “Sycamore”
was only one block long, a winding and steep incline connecting two broader
commercial avenues and had a kind of mid-century appeal that made this part of
the city feel more like a village than an urban grid of humorless red brick
buildings. The street housed just four small “ma & pa” businesses alongside
the two-family houses and pre-war apartments: a bakery, a tiny beauty salon, a
shoe repair and the gift shop; together these comprised a small town fantasy in
the midst of a large, noisy and increasingly annoying residential area that slowly
had been taken over by the usual gang of chain stores and an influx of tacky
merchandise. The chain stores sold things like plastic serving trays with strange
Santa motifs, fuzzy red stockings of unidentifiable fabric for hanging on your
non-existent fireplace, suspiciously out of date shiny bags of Ghiradelli chocolate
and big, ugly rubber skeletons that during the earlier October holiday seemed
to kick off the whole seasonal madness.
Beautiful Things was wedged in between the shoe repair and
pastry shop about halfway up the hill, its hall mark a display window that
though quite small was nothing less than mesmerizing. It was impossible to
resist gazing into this semi-precious cave of wonders while out doing the chores
or running from one mind numbing, mundane errand to the next without stopping.
On rich, black velvet jewelry pads carefully placed for optimum viewing sat
marcasite pins that blazed like diamonds, glittering ovals of amber and
polished stones of blue topaz sharing the reflected glow of the overhead track lights
with pewter letter openers and miniature Tiffany-style lamps; semi-precious
objects totally unnecessary for survival but succeeding in prompting all sorts
of forgotten longings and desires for small luxuries. The window itself faced
southwest, and when the afternoon sun bounced off the glass the whole sparkling
collage became addictively hypnotic.
The interior of the store was no larger than fifteen by
twenty feet or so, with a kind of closet-office in the back hidden behind a flowery
curtain. Once inside one immediately was bedazzled by the jewelry boxes- some
of them musical with slowly turning ballerinas- as well as a colorful selection
of silk scarves and ties, one-of-a-kind tea pots, ceramic vases, hand-painted
dishes and of course piles of rings, bracelets and chokers, all neatly stacked
inside the three-tiered glass case behind which the proprietors ruled their little
kingdom of chotchkas. There were also a few obligatory gag gifts such as
miniature slot machines and sleek, tiny clocks with sun dials that went all the
way up to the year of infinity, but everything was tastefully arranged and
carefully selected at the “shows” which Mel and Ruby always seemed to be
attending. I know just what you’re looking for, Ruby would assure you after the
better part of an hour spent considering a of shiny array of objects, none of
which exactly did the trick; You want something smaller, daintier, perhaps with
an amethyst in the center, right? They’ll probably have them at the show we’re going
to next week- come back then. And she acted very much like she meant it. She
would find this for you. Her mission was not to stoke the embers of your flagging,
mindless consumerism, that vague yen that left you succumbing to ads trying to
convince you that what you really required were seven different kinds of
bathroom cleaners or a thirty-eight different face creams, but actually to
locate that one special object that would totally change your life, or at least
this was what she wanted you to believe. Ruby wasn’t really being helpful at
such moments, even though she appeared to be holding out the carrot of finding
“exactly the right thing,” this mainly having to do with her insane anxiety.
She was so incredibly anxiety-ridden she could barely conceal her maniacal
sense of impending doom for fear that perhaps one of the display “trees” of dangly
earrings might just topple over with the customer’s next sneeze; this nervousness
of manner comprising a kind of existential tick tended to upset the whole tight
little sense of controlled cordiality she tried so hard to maintain in the
store. . . .
