Bob Bestler | Remaining in the comfort zone

In a weak moment recently I mentioned to Santa (aka, she who must be obeyed) that I wouldn’t mind getting a Kindle for Christmas.

She, of course, looked at me as if I had just said I would be celebrating New Year’s on Mars.

Had we not, after all, once owned a bookstore? Had we not enjoyed those euphoric years surrounded by bookcases filled with the wonders of the written word? Had we not watched our dreams of building a bookstore empire vanish in the quiet of too many Grand Strand off-seasons? Well, yeah, that.

But I had noticed that the price of a Kindle was only $79 - roughly the same as a couple dozen ProV1 golf balls. (She noticed the price of Kindle Fire was only $199 and that I should ask Santa for a Kindle Fire if I ask Santa for anything.)

I’d also heard from people who have electronic books and they seem to love them. So why not? Wasn’t it time I join the 21st century?

Then I visited a bookstore and as I pawed my way through dozens of books I didn’t know existed, all thoughts of Kindle went flying.

I wanted every book I touched. I loved their cover designs. I loved their heft, their feel, their smell. How could a cold flat Kindle ever duplicate that?

The cost of a Kindle, as I understand, is only the beginning. It is but a container. You still have to buy the book (or rent it these days, I guess) so now you have a cold flat container that lights up.

A few days later, I read a Harper’s magazine review of “One Click: Jeff Bezos and the Rise of Amazon.Com” by Larry McMurtry, himself a pretty good book writer.

McMurtry noted, with unfeigned contempt, that Amazon founder Bezos had an “obvious irritation at the continued existence of the paperbound book, which provides, still, serious competition to sales of his e-book device, the Kindle.”

McMurtry said Bezos believed that after 500 years it was time for the traditional book to be replaced by a brave new world of Kindles.

Sorry, Jeffie. Not on my watch.

McMurtry, who owns a bookstore himself, said it well:

“One thing we offer that he can’t is serendipity _ a book browser’s serendipity, the thrill of the accidental find...Skimming a few strange pages is surely as important as making one click.’’

Dear Santa: Skip that Kindle, will ya? I’ll take the ProV1s.