Overthunk

On another trip to the Half Price Books store, I had to use the loo. They've cleverly used the covers from old Harlequin Romance novels from the 50's and 60's as a border atop the wainscoting, so they're at eye level as you wash your hands and such. There were bunches and bunches, but a few titles struck me as perhaps more... significant than others. Could our pre-Internet forebears have been more clued in to the variant stripes of sexuality than is commonly suspected? Exhibit A: Gay Cavalier Exhibit B: Master of Saramanca Exhibit C: Citadel of Swallows and finally, Exhibit D: A Night for Possums.

Those who read this screed with any regularity are already acquainted with my love of John Updike, who, besides just possessing my esteemed enamorment, has won the Pulitzer Prize for Fiction not once but twice. The day before yesterday I just happened to drop by the Half-Price Books in my town, where I, on a whim, thought some new Updike might just be the thing. So I picked this up. Note its price: $4.98. Well, the day went on, I continued shopping, visited with friends, and was waiting for my Independence Day Freedom Potato Salad spuds to finish boiling when I thought I might read a story or three while I was waiting. After all, there were 40 of them. Oh, look at that, an inscription in a used book. Let's see whose Great Aunt Margot gave this to them on which holiday... Well, I'll declare. That there says, "for Mark a rare volume John Updike" Being me, my first thought at any awesome event such as this is, "Nuh UH ." So of course I went and checked here ...