Zibby chats with indie bookstore owner and host of the popular From the Front Porch podcast, Annie B. Jones, about her earnest, graceful, and beautifully written new book, ORDINARY TIME: Lessons Learned While Staying Put. Annie shares her journey from journalist to beloved bookseller in Thomasville, GA, and describes the unexpected beauty she’s found in staying rooted and building a quiet life, challenging the idea that loud lives matter most. Then, she delves into her reflections on small-town life, motherhood, friendship, introversion, and the transformative power of books.

Transcript:

Zibby: Hi. 

Annie: Hi. How are you? 

Zibby: I'm good. How are you? 

Annie: Good. I love your book wall. I 

Zibby: love your book wall. I feel like actually we are the same person and the fact that we just showed up on Zoom, like wearing the same outfit and the same background is like no surprise to me. 

Annie: So fun. I love it. You're right. We totally, we match. This will be fun to see. 

Zibby: Oh my gosh. I'm actually gonna jump right into the episode. 

Annie: Okay. 

Zibby: If that's okay, because I am so obsessed with your book, and.. 

Annie: Thank you. 

Zibby: Loved it so much. I love your podcast. 

Annie: Thank you. 

Zibby: Your bookstore. All of it. I and I don't think I've ever.

Like related to anyone more than you in ordinary time. So Congra, just thank you. 

Annie: Thank you so much. I'm thrilled to be here and I'm so grateful for all the work you do for indie bookstores and authors like me, and it's a joy to get to talk to you today. 

Zibby: Aw, thank you. And by the way, I saw on your Instagram, congratulations.

Baby Paul Jones on his way. 

Annie: Thank you. I can't believe all the things happening in 2025. 

Zibby: Oh my goodness. Having just finished your book and reading all of your thoughts on motherhood and all of that like the fact that this is now, like the coda is just so perfect. 

Annie: Yeah. Thank you.

Zibby: Anyway okay, let's back up. Ordinary time lessons learned while staying put, why don't you tell listeners what your book is about? 

Annie: Absolutely. So I have lived in or around my hometown my entire life. The exception of college and probably 10 to 12 years ago, my husband and I moved to a small town just down the road from my hometown.

And I've always loved writing. I've always loved adventure. I've loved books, I've loved travel, and I think I envisioned, maybe this is a common millennial problem. I think I envisioned a, an air quote, bigger life for myself and I felt like my world was really small, but as I began growing roots in this small town and running and operating the bookstore and developing relationships with people in my neighborhood, people in my community. I realized that, oh, there's actually quite a bit of storytelling in staying too, and so I've written my whole life journaled. Written essays, blog posts, whatever. And I finally decided maybe staying is the through line.

And so I wanted to write a collection of essays and quiet stories that would be just about ordinary, quiet life because I do believe, I really do believe this, and I say this in the book, that's what most of us are doing. Some of us do get the grand big adventures or get to live in big cities, but a lot of us are just chilling out in downtowns and small towns and suburbs.

And I think there are stories there too, and lives worth talking about. And so I wanted to write about that a little bit. 

Zibby: That's amazing. The book is structured as linked essays essentially. And you take us from your role as a bookstore owner. You take us through your childhood, will you introduce us to your grandmother's?

You, we get to see the whole progression of your career. And where you are versus where you thought, like you said, your last chapter. I'm sitting here in New York reading, you're ode to New York. Anytime you wanna visit, come hang out. We'll have, I'll take you all around New York and I know you've been here, but I love it.

One thing that I absolutely loved about the book was all the ways you talk about books and about loving books and what books have done for you. Can I read a little section of it? Is that okay? 

Annie: Yeah, absolutely. 

Zibby: And by the way, I wrote a memoir called Bookends, and I feel like you, might like it.

Okay. I'm gonna add it to, it's very similar. It's very similar. You'll see a lot of parallels between us and our love of reading and whatever. Anyway, don't normally talk about it, but, okay. Here's what you said about books. Although I really could have excerpted the entire thing, but over the years I have gotten lost in thrillers, said on hijacked airplanes, become an honorary daughter to large, dysfunctional families with memorable matriarchs.

Rolled my eyes at countless East Coast, blue Bloods and badly behaving rich people fallen in love with rom-coms. Nora Ephron would envy or at least appreciate. I have revisited the classics of my childhood, including little women, but also Bloom Mobility and the Babysitters Club. Emily of New Moon in the works of John Bauer.

I have discovered a love of poetry. Thank you Kate Bearer. Gosh, she's so great and encountered modern American novelists, who I believe deserve a place in the cannon. You keep going and then you say, I've left my reading chair a GOG and hung over from prose. I wish I could call my own books. Fill me up.

Quiet fills me up. My home fills me up. I read books because yes, by some twist of fate and act of serendipity, it is my job. I read books because at their best, they make me better, more empathetic, more socially aware, more in tune to the stranger beside me. They help me imagine a better future, provide answers to my insatiable questions.

Take me to places I'll never get to go. I read books because they're an easy point of entry to relationship. They spark conversations and make me an enjoyable dinner Companion. I hope books eliminate my awkwardness, awaken my expertise, and move me forward when I want to stay put. I read books because they fill up my depleted soul and give me renewed energy for a life spent outside the walls of my home and the safe pages of the novels I love.

And then you write a few more beautiful paragraphs and end by saying books bring me back to myself. It's all true. So beautiful. Oh my God. It's all true. Talk about your love of reading and all of that. 

Annie: I've loved to read my whole life. Truly, I have very few memories of not reading. My mother likes to tell a story of how she sat down to read an American girl book to me, and she was reading to me before bed one night and she fell asleep.

And when she, startled awake. I was already done with the book. I devour words. In fact, sometimes I have to retrain my brain to read a little more slowly so that I don't just completely binge books away. But I think when I sat down to finally fully express my love of reading. I wanted people to know. Reading isn't just a way to hole up, which certainly for me, I love sitting in my reading chair. It's, I'm highly introverted. It's a way to recharge, it's a way to decompress. But I, the more I thought about it, the more I realized that recharge, peace is key. Reading in my chair at home, or reading on an airplane or reading outside by my pool.

It enables me to go be a bookseller, not just logistically, because now I've got a book that I wanna talk about, but also it. Rejuvenates me. Books aren't just about escapism, although I think a lot of us do love escaping into literature, but it's also better preparing me reading and good books better prepare me for a life lived outside my comfy cozy chair.

And that's one of the things I wanted to articulate because I love hiding away in my house and getting lost in a world of words. But ultimately I hope what reading does for me is enable me to go be a better friend, better daughter, better wife, maybe one day, a better mother. And so books I hope empower me and recharge me and rejuvenate me.

I think in the book maybe I talk about how books are like a flashlight. They help you move forward, and I am inclined, the whole book is about staying put. I'm inclined to stay put and so books help me. Get the gumption I need maybe to move forward. 

Zibby: I love that. And I love in the book you say you're, people might not know that you're an introvert, but you are.

I'm like the exact same way. Like I would prefer never to leave my house. Yeah, same. But we can have introvert, you can be introverts and have extroverted qualities where yes, you connect with people, but like having the books as the through line and the conversation starter and all that can be so helpful and so important.

Annie: Yeah. Yeah, like I said, it takes away my awkwardness and I certainly have noticed, my husband has even commented on it, he's highly extroverted and we would go out to dinners or things and I would, oh gosh, I would just hate, sitting at a round table at a banquet or something with strangers that you don't know.

There's very few things more awkward to me. Happy hour maybe. And so I would. Sit at these tables and I would feel so uncomfortable. But Jordan made the comment, my husband made the comment. Since the bookstore, I'm not, maybe I'm a little awkward but I can easily engage in conversation. And I think it's because books are a common thing to talk about.

Bookstores are a common thing to talk about. Like you can actually really connect with people through what you've read most recently. And that has been a perk. I didn't really anticipate. I couldn't agree more. 

Zibby: Talk about the bookstore. So in your book you talked about how the, sort of the serendipity and how it you ended up applying just to work in the store and you found that email and read it back and now you own the store and have for many years.

Tell us about that journey. 

Annie: I was a writer and journalist. I was a journalism major, and so I was a writer and editor for a legal publication in my hometown of Tallahassee, Florida, and a bookstore opened near my home and that was pretty unusual. Tallahassee is a wonderful place. I love Tallahassee, but it's not the most walkable and literally this bookstore opened up.

Two blocks from our house and I could walk to it and it felt like something out of a movie. It felt like I was finally getting to live my big city dreams in Tallahassee and I was so excited to see it in my hometown that I emailed the owner and I said, Hey, if you ever need any help, I was picturing story time lady shelver of books, just anything I was willing to do, volunteer, whatever she needed, and a couple months later, she was very kind.

She wrote me back a couple of months later, they were looking for a manager. And because I grew up in Tallahassee, which is the capital city of Florida, I'd never worked retail, even in high school. My jobs were state government jobs. Like my summer job was like being a male girl for one of the downtown buildings.

And so retail was totally new to me and I had this job that I really liked, that I that utilized my degree, which felt unheard of at that time. Maybe still. But I decided to do it and managed that store for about a year before the owner decided she wanted to focus on the flagship store, which was in nearby Thomasville, Georgia.

And she offered me the chance to own it and my husband and I are not risk takers. We do not necessarily come from what I would call entrepreneurial backgrounds. And so it was a lot of thought and prayer and pros and cons lists before we finally decided, okay, let's do this. And the previous owner of the store graciously allowed and created this plan where I would earn the store through sweat equity, which was slightly more appealing to my risk averse brain. So I earned the store by working in the store and kind of an Old Testament set up is what I felt like, I loved earning the store in that way. I felt like I was proving myself to Thomasville.

I'm not from Thomasville originally, so I felt like I had to prove myself a little bit. And even though I know I've said this before owning and running and operating the bookstore is the hardest I've ever worked in my whole life. It is just a labor of love, but there is still true magic to it. I don't work on the floor as much as I used to.

I'm often upstairs paying bills or working on the podcast or what have you. But anytime I get to open a box of books or shelf books or work on a Saturday and read to kids, it's exactly what I dreamed it could be, and it's just a real privilege to get to, to run this landmark store. The store has existed for 40 years and so I've been there for 12 and so to get to play a small part in her history is one of the greatest privileges of my life.

Zibby: Ugh, that is so beautiful. I love that. You also have this really interesting essay, which it touches on something people don't talk about that much, which is the connections you have to the people you work with and how it feels with that unique set that, that unique feeling of grief when you lose, quote unquote a colleague when they move on.

And you've been in the trenches together and how you've stayed. Another example of your staying, which I love, is the through line for connecting all these stories. And how you've stayed, but they've gone on and some stayed. But tell me about that, because they are. And you say, it's not your colleagues are not your family and you get it, and the whole Instagram thing, whatever.

And yet there is a huge connection. So tell me more about that. 

Annie: Especially small business. As I say, it has gone totally outta fashion and rightfully so to call your colleagues, your family. But it also feels odd to keep calling people, colleagues, when we really are, you've worded it perfectly, we're in the trenches together.

Small business, you are cleaning toilets together, you are dusting shelves, you are dealing with. Sometimes less than pleasant customers. And so you really form a bond. And it had not occurred to me. When I took over the store, I think we were a team of two or three people including me and I.

Until maybe a few years in 7, 8, 7 or eight years in, it didn't occur to me that I would be the person who stayed while other people left. I don't know why that didn't occur to me. I watch a lot of TV and pop culture and I guess I thought it was like Sam Malone and Cheers and everybody just hangs out together all the time and life is not like an episode of Cheers.

And it took me a while to realize, oh, if I do my job well, and hopefully I foster creativity and professionalism, and hopefully the bookshelf gives our staffers the skills they need to move on to their next thing. That means they're going to move on to their next thing and. I have never stayed at a job this long.

I have worked since I was 15. I love working, but certainly the bookshelf is my longest tenured position. And so to look around and know, oh, not everybody who works here. Is going to stay put in the way I have. And in fact, sometimes it is better for them to move on. And I've had the, again, the privilege of watching people leave the bookstore and become managers at other bookstores, in some cases start their own bookstore.

And that, oh my gosh, that is extremely gratifying. And that makes me feel like, oh, we're doing it like, like we're preparing people. We're. Giving them what they need to move on, but that does mean they're gonna move on. And there is a real bittersweetness to that where I'm proud of the work we've done together.

And certainly they have made the bookshelf better. They've made my work better, but it is sad to see them go. And so I'm really grateful. I write about this in the book. While I was writing that essay, I thought about my current team, and many of us have been here now. A couple of staffers have worked at the store for five or six years, and that's in retail.

That is an unbelievable retention rate. And so that also was ironic to realize, oh, maybe some people do stay and maybe some people do wanna plant roots in Thomasville or at the bookshelf. And there's something really lovely and surprising about that too. 

Zibby: I love that. And you developed such close connections with your customers.

Annie: Yes. 

Zibby: You had such a moving essay about Al who used to come to your store, and then he wasn't there as much and it turns out he had passed away. And the connections that you make to people who just come in and the loss you feel and the loss, we all feel when somebody is a part of our day-to-day life, but they're not a, they're not one of our best friends or whatever.

And you have all of that grief as well when their presence becomes an absence. 

Annie: Yeah, I wanted to write about that because one of my favorite parts about life at the bookshelf, and I think you could potentially find this in any third place, like any bookstore or bar or what have you. But I think it's especially true in a small town or a small community or a neighborhood where you have your regulars and you have your people that you see every day.

And so much of my life has been spent developing deep, long lasting relationships I'm friends with, the friends I've had since I was eight. My husband and I have known each other for over 20 years, I think, give or take. And so I love getting in there for the long haul and a lot of bookstore life is what the world might call.

Maybe more shallow relationships, but what I discovered is those are the relationships that actually make life worth living. And I think even the research is starting to show that's the solution. That's the antidote to loneliness. And I certainly have found that to be the case at the bookshelf. My life is.

So full and vibrant now. It was before, but it was vibrant because of these close-knit friendships. That's what I had in my early to mid twenties. And then now what I have is a handful of close-knit friendships, but mostly what I have is a cast of quirky characters who I interact with at the store, whether it's my fellow staffers or a customer, and.

You just develop really lovely relationships with these customers, even if you never know their last name, or even if you weirdly only know the names of their kids because their kids are who come in for story time or to buy books or what have you. And sometimes I just am in awe especially at the holidays when the store is at its most bustling, or Saturday when the store is full and busy, just looking around and thinking, I know these people.

I know all these people. And then with somebody like Al, who I write about in the book, that's one of, I don't think you're supposed to have favorites, but that is one of my favorite essays in the book. You have somebody like Al who you feel this immense kinship with? And then you start to notice, wait a minute, where are they?

I haven't seen them in a few days. And that could mean absolutely nothing. Or it could mean something really sad and hard. And what do you do? How do you grieve a relationship that doesn't fully feel like your relationship to grieve? He wasn't my actual grandfather, he just felt like one. 'cause he came in and was so friendly and kind.

And how do you mourn that and how do you honor that? And I wanted to honor. Al and Paula and Rose, those were three key three customers. I really wanted to name, I wanted to honor them well, and I hope that I did. 

Zibby: You absolutely did, and I just felt it so intimately. This happened to me at my bookstore in Santa Monica as people, I would find out that they had lost their homes in the fire. And I'm like, oh my gosh. We were just there like a day before we were picking out a book for the daughter, and I wonder what she thought about the book that we picked out and anyway, you, the connections circle.

Annie: And the conversations. 

Zibby: And the conversations. Yeah. 

Annie: Yeah. I think I say. That it's I didn't realize how much of a bartender you would be. Because people come to the register, or you're standing back in the children's section and you're having conversations about why they're picking out this book or what has brought them to the store that day.

And it becomes pretty intimate, pretty quickly. And so you do feel like you know each other and you. I think when tragedy strikes a neighborhood or bad weather rolls through town, I think about, for us, that's often looked like hurricanes or what have you, and you just feel like these are people I care about what happens to them, to their kids, to their home, and I think. Like I said, a lot of people who own or operate or work in these third places where people do feel comfortable to stick around and chat. I think we feel a deep relationship with the people we interact with every day. 

Zibby: Agree. Oh my gosh. Another chapter in the book. I could talk to you all day about this book.

Another chapter talks about book club and the, this is deepening what we're talking about. 

Annie: Yes. 

Zibby: In terms of relationships and what different relationships. Bring to our lives, which I think is what many of your essays are talking about. They can be someone who passes you by, they can be at surfaces.

Okay. Maybe you don't need to be best friends with people in your book club. Maybe you do wanna just go and talk about a book and then move on. But that is also really important and that is another soul fortifying thing, is to have those types of relationships. 

Annie: Yes. 

Zibby: So talk a little more about the book club and your philosophy.

Annie: So this is something that certainly has changed for me over the years. My book club that I was a part of in my early to mid twenties, I became deep and lasing. These women are still some of my best friends, even though none of them live locally. None. None of them were spread out all over the country.

But these are. These are still some of my nearest and dearest relationships. And so when I moved to Thomasville and started a new book club, that was my expectation was, okay, these are gonna be my new lifelong friends. We're gonna love each other forever. And what I quickly discovered was, oh. No. And then there's that disappointment when life doesn't match up with your expectations, which I also write about in the book a little bit.

I'm a high expectations person, and I had these really high expectations of book club, which as it turns out, is maybe too much pressure to put on something as simple as book club. And once I realized, oh. But Book Club is still okay because in fact, I can sit and just talk about books and it takes the pressure off.

Like I don't have to sit and divulge the deepest, truest parts of myself. I could just sit around in a corner and talk about books once I took the pressure off. Actually, I did develop some really lovely friendships. Some of them I write about in the books in the book. But mostly what I think I discovered with my Thomasville book club was.

Book club can just be book club. It doesn't have to be where you find your next kindred spirit. It could just be where you eat snacks and talk about whatever Elizabeth Gilbert just wrote, and that's okay. Like in, in fact, that might be just what you need on a random Tuesday night. Maybe you don't actually need, these deep, intimate, three hour long conversations.

Maybe what you need is to grab coffee and sit in a corner and chat about books with a couple of friends. And I think book club, one book club taught me the value of course, of lifelong relationship or deep and lasting friendship. And then one book club certainly had some of that. But I think it really taught me to lower my expectations and to just let, surface relationships because I think they're more than that, but surface relationships just be what they are.

And again, take some pressure off. I encountered a woman I talk about in the book where she joined Bunco. And I asked her, I was like, oh my gosh, did you meet? Was this a good way to meet people? Whatever. And she kinda looked at me like I was a little nuts. And she said. No, I, it's just Bunco and I think I immediately was like, wait just book club.

Like something could just be what it is. And so sometimes Book club is just book club and turns out that might be enough. 

Zibby: You host a podcast on the front porch from the front, from the, sorry, I knew I had something wrong. 

Annie: That's okay. 

Zibby: I'm sorry. I have it. I'm. Following whatever from the front porch. I listened to your latest episode and talking about your February books and.. 

Annie: Oh yeah.

Zibby: How you I also loved Liz Harris's book, how to Sleep at Night. Really good. 

Annie: Yeah. I really enjoyed it. 

Zibby: And even just you're being honest about what was going on in your life and how it was harder to read in February and it's okay. There are seasons when we can read more and when we have life gets in the way and all of that. And in the book you talk about coming to terms with some of the negative reviews in the beginning when people were criticizing your voice and all of this. I remember getting one review for my podcast. I was literally like, sobbing. And then you were crying and I'm like, yes, I get it.

How did you move past that? Because you end the essay in a much stronger place. Like you wanna gimme a better view. Go ahead. Whatever I'm doing me. And also just your experience of the podcast and how that's been for you. 

Annie: You know what will really test your strong sense of self and the conclusions that you've reached about negative reviews is then putting a book into the world.

Zibby: Yeah, exactly. 

Yeah. You thought that was bad. Wait until the book, right? 

Annie: Exactly. But so many things, I think life experience, so at first, when. The podcast has been around since 2013. We're over 500 episodes at this point. It has changed in format over the years. It's changed in terms of co-hosts or guests over the years.

Its current iteration is one I really love because a lot of members of the bookstore staff are able to participate in the show, which I love, but those initial, maybe it goes back to this idea that the customer's always right. So those initial reviews made a deep impact where I thought, oh my gosh you don't like my voice. You think I giggle too much? Or You prefer a male co-host to me, like it was, it felt like drinking out of a fire hydrant. And there is a part of me that is a people pleaser, and so I thought, I've gotta tweak these things. I've gotta listen to all this feedback. It's almost like when you're in school, and maybe this is revealing too much about my psyche, but it's when you're in school and you get like a 90 and you're like, oh my gosh, what could I have done to get a hundred?

That probably is too much about me as a person. But anyway, and so you read some of these, yeah. So you read some of these reviews and you're thinking, what can I change? Or what do I need to change? And then you start reading reviews and they start to count. They're, they start to counteract the other.

And that's when you start to realize, oh, this is subjective. Some people like that I giggle or some people like my voice, and that's when you realize these voices might not be the ones I need to be listening to. I wanted to make it clear in the book, and I want it to be true in my life, that I'm willing to listen to criticism or feedback that makes me, or the show or the bookstore better, a better writer, a better whatever.

But I think I have learned over the years. The voices. Who I should be willing to listen to are few, and that could be a trusted customer. It could be a beloved mentor. It could be the voice of my husband or my parents, or my fellow staffers who are extremely wise and knowledgeable and thoughtful. Those are the voices I listen to.

Not necessarily, although I'm grateful for reviews, not necessarily the reviews that may change on a whim. Depends on the episode they heard. I think I've just had to learn, especially if I'm going to continue living even part of my life in even my small little corner of the internet, but it is to the public.

If I'm going to live my life in. Some form of, with the public, I'm going to have to really pay attention to whose voices matter and whose feedback matters. And again, it's really being put to the test by putting a really personal book out into the world. It's not going to be a book that's for everyone, but I'd like to think.

I have a lot of practice. The bookshelf has given me a lot of practice. The podcast has given me a lot of practice to see who am I going to listen to, what feedback matters, and what feedback doesn't matter, and that I think that's one of the only ways to continue, not only maybe. Putting myself out there in the public, but also to be a creative.

I think if you, it's taken me a long time to even say that I'm creative, but if you're going to be a writer or an artist or a creative person who puts work into the world, I think you've gotta develop some pretty thick skin. And some days mine is thicker than others, but it's something I, it's something I'm working on and I think the podcast helped me develop some of that.

Zibby: Love that. Annie. Thank you so much. This was amazing. You're awesome. The book was fabulous, and anything I can do to help let me know. 

Annie: Thank you, Zibby. I loved our conversation and I'm so grateful for you willing to have me on the show. 

Zibby: Of course.