Our bookshelves have always had a story to tell. The wood was used in an Iowa warehouse for years, giving it the extra character you can’t find at Home Depot. Kate’s dad hauled those boards 200 miles so we could save money furnishing the store. We pulled dozens of nails out of each 12-ft board, sanding them down to build our bookshelves in the driveway on nights and weekends.
18 months later, I guess they’ve earned another story to tell.
Photo credit Mike Frizzell, Johnson County Post.
About the Fire
In the early morning of August 14, an electrical fire started at The Torreador restaurant next door. Luckily, a patrolman drove past shortly after, saw the smoke and fire, and called the fire department. They were able to put the fire out quickly, saving our building that has stood since the 1950’s.
A fire hose puts out a lot of water, though, and much of it ended up in our bookstore. We also share a wall with the restaurant, so everything inside our store was layered with soot and ash from the fire. Our inventory was ruined and toxic smoke fumes worked their way into our personal belongings and electronics. The firefighters had to bust through our front and back doors to quell the fire.
Shocking News
I learned about the fire when a police officer banged our door at 5:30am. Not a great feeling – you know that.
Somebody is dead, I thought.
“Does Katie live here?”
I looked over to see if her car was in the drive. Kate’s not dead, I thought, my mind was swirling. She was just inside.
“Does she work at that bookstore?”
“Yes, we own the bookstore.”
That’s how I learned what had happened.
I went inside to wake Kate and tell her there was a fire at the store, knowing exactly how much of our life – financially, emotionally, and physically – had been invested into that place. She drove over right away, in the dark. I stayed to get our girls ready for school.
What have we been up to?
We’ve been closed since then. It’s been 4 weeks now.
Week 1 - We waited for the building to be inspected and, after a few days, learned we could return, but that we should take precautions spending time in the toxic fumes. We got approval to turn our power back on. We took our most valuable things home to be cleaned and stored safely: gifts from friends and family, books and posters autographed by authors, vinyl records inherited from my dad when he passed, dozens of plants, and drawings by all of our kids.
Week 2 - We had to clean out the inventory and equipment, disposing of everything that couldn’t be salvaged – literally undoing the work we’d done for the past 2 years. At home in our spare room, Laramie began storing inventory and preparing for weekend popups. My brother, Blake, spent hours in the backyard wiping plants clean by hand.
Weeks 3 & 4 - Everything from the store is now back at our house – filling the garage, driveway, and back patio (I keep imagining our neighbors singing this song to poke fun). We are slowly getting things cleaned and ready to use again, with the help of several people who have generously offered their time, skills, or garages for storage. That’s one of the bright spots – so many people have pitched in, and most of them are people we only met because we opened this bookstore. Your world opens up quite a bit when you put yourself out there.
We are still receiving new book shipments, and on August 23rd we hosted our first outdoor popup. We can’t go inside the building, but our mission is to “Share the Joy of Books” and we are sharing the joy of books. So far, we’ve had two Saturday pop-ups and plan to set up every Saturday until we reopen.
What's next?
Everyone’s first question is, “Are you going to be able to reopen?”
Hell yes, we are going to reopen. We want this store to be around for the next 40 years. Even if we did call it quits, I’m not sure what we would do next. We built all of this intending for our kids to learn how to work hard at something and to get to know their neighbors. We want them to grow up here and maybe take over someday. How do you decide what replaces that?
Hell yes, we are going to reopen. We want this store to be around for the next 40 years.
We don’t have an exact timeline because there are several parties involved (landlord, insurance, etc), but we are starting repairs next week. It’s important to us that we open before the holidays, so that is the main goal.
To get back open, our building must be cleaned and the fumes mitigated, drywall and flooring needs replaced (checkered floors, of course), we need new front and back doors, the ceiling in our storage room needs repaired, and I’m probably missing quite a few items on the checklist.
But we are not afraid of hard work, and we will figure out how to get it done.
Photo credit Morgan Weber
We'll be back.
The first time we did this, we didn’t know if it would even work. We didn’t know if anyone would show up or care about our little bookstore. We didn’t know if we would be able to support our family from this or if everyone else was right when they said “You can’t compete with Amazon.”
But we've learned a lot, and things will fall into place faster than they did two years ago. This time, we know what kinds of books our neighbors love. We’ve made wonderful new friends who are waiting (very impatiently!) to help us put the shop back together. This time, we have a wonderful staff who will help stock shelves and be there to say “hello” at our grand re-opening.
These bookshelves will keep telling their story and we will see you soon, neighbor.
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Justin is co-owner and "marketing guy" at Monstera's. Follow his work on Instagram at @justinwieners and @hotdogdesignstudio. You can usually find him dropping off packages, pricing old books, or chatting behind the counter with neighbors on Saturdays.
