A Special Kind of Crazy

Yesterday, I was surfing Facebook and a little box popped up that asked if I wanted to “be friends” with Thomas Cary. I almost fell over. Here’s why…

“Biblio– decorator” is how Mr. Thomas Cary describes himself. Yeah, I see that. Mr. Thomas Cary has curated one of the best wholesale rare and vintage book collections in the world. He claims that he sells to Tory Burch, Ralph Lauren, Kate Spade and J.Crew. He has over 15,000 rare and vintage books. He doesn’t have smarty-pants vintage books. He has the vintage books that you want. Vintage Cecil Beaton, vintage signed Duchess of Windsor cookbooks, vintage Diana Vreeland Allure book, vintage Ian Fleming, vintage M. Hubert de Givenchy and on and on and on… And on. But here’s the thing, he’s a complete douche bag.

 

There is a small handful of blog posts/articles about Mr. Thomas Cary and all of them allude to the fact that the guy is a bit “off ” but they never come right out and say it.

Check out these blogs/articles regarding Mr. Thomas Cary. This is also where I found all of the photos. Merci. The Dandy Portraits, New York Social Diary, Unabashedly Prep.

Here’s the thing… I like people who are a bit “off.” I like the eccentric, the unusual, the extraordinary, the peculiar, the misfit. That is my kind of people. What I don’t like are vindictive crazy people off their meds.

Let me explain. Let’s go back to the year 2010 when I lived in New York City and worked at the revered Assouline Publishing. Part of my job was to help the owner, Prosper Assouline, curate our vintage and rare book selections. One day, “corporate” asked me if I would investigate a certain Mr. Thomas Cary and his book collection. Apparently, Mr. Thomas Cary had been calling the corporate offices religiously to see if we would be interested in purchasing some of his books for the Assouline collection. I was totally up for the job! Actually I was excited. “Of course I’ll go check it out,” I said naïvely. Corporate then said, “Thanks and good luck. You might want to have your guard up because we heard this guy is a little bit cuckoo.” No problem, I thought. I deal with crazy everyday.

 

 

So off I go at 7 PM at night in the snow to Mr. Thomas Cary’s apartment/boutique on the Upper East side of Manhattan. I ring the doorbell and the door is opened by a Preppy Handbook cookie-cutter of a man. Tall, kind of pudgy, pink cheeks wearing a pastel madras blazer. He welcomes me in and as soon as I stepped one foot in the door I thought, “Uh–oh. Danger.” You know how your instincts send out a red flag warning? My first thought was to run. My second thought was that I was intrigued. His 900 ft.² shit hole apartment was head to toe books. Borderline hoardish. No, not borderline, I take that back. It was complete full on textbook case hoarding. I also got a slight sense of Silence Of the Lambs. There was not one inch of neutral space. It also had a “certain undefinable stench.” I asked if he would keep the door open while I checked out his stock. He agreed easily as if he had been asked this before.

 

 

I will hand it to the guy. He has an insane collection of vintage books. I could have been there forever salivating over his stock. Mr. Assouline and I had previously agreed that we would primarily start a relationship with Mr. Thomas Cary on a consignment basis. That’s to say, we would take the books, display them at the shop, and if we sold them we would give Mr. Thomas Cary his commission. Mr. Assouline trusted me to choose the books. OMG, I had a field day. I selected about 20 books, very very exclusive and very very expensive. They were to be delivered to the shop the next day. I thanked Mr. Thomas Cary for his expertise but what I really meant was, “thank you for not killing me.”

 

 

Back at the Assouline shop, I took great pride in displaying our new collection of vintage books. I’m not sure what the party was for but we had a huge soirée at the shop and the vintage books were the star. The vintage books were a complete success. Mr. Tommy Hilfiger was the big buyer of the evening. He bought a vintage Hermes book and I can’t remember what else but it was a lot. So, it looks like this relationship with Mr. Thomas Cary was going to work out. Not so fast.

 

The very next day after the party Mr. Thomas Cary started calling the shop every 25 minutes asking if his books had sold and if we could cut him a check as soon as possible. I politely told him that some had sold the previous evening and the rest were still in the shop. Next 25 minutes, same phone call, same conversation. This lasted hours and days. I called the corporate offices and explained to them that yes, they were right, he is crazy. I remember the corporate office telling me that if he continued to call incessantly that we would have to cease our relationship with him. Mr. Thomas Cary called our shop at least 30 times a day. It was the height of the Christmas season and the shop was packed with customers. Sometimes I was the only one working there. Selling books, wrapping books, answering phone calls, organizing corporate gifts, organizing the bookshelves, helping customers make selections, raising profits threefold, organizing deliveries blah blah blah. It was a lot of work for one person to do. It doesn’t help that some lunatic called every 25 minutes to see if we could cut him a check for his vintage books. So, here’s what happened… Mr. Thomas Cary called again and I answered the phone. I happened to have his business card in my hand and I was looking at his name as I spoke to him. The store was packed and I had like five people in line waiting to be helped. But I still had to deal with crazy on the telephone. So I said, “Cary, would it be possible for me to call you after the shop closes?” That’s it. I accidentally accidentally accidentally called him Cary very quickly instead of Mr. Cary. It was a slip of the tongue. Nothing more than that. I didn’t even realize that I’d said, “Cary.”

 

So, about two months later I was fired out of the blue. I really didn’t care because I did not want to work there anymore because I was not feeling well. It turns out it was the start of my ALS. But I did care that I was fired. I’ve never been fired in my life. I loved Assouline Publishing and I adored the owner, Prosper Assouline. Why was I being fired? It turns out our darling psychopath Mr. Thomas Cary had called the corporate offices and complained that I called him “Cary.” Swear to God! He complained to Assouline that I had “no education, no matters, no sense of respect.” This insecure, completely financially desperate unprofessional little dough ball got me fired. I have to say that I was a little disappointed with Assouline. Anyway, I still love Assouline but I f*cking  loathe Cary, I mean Mr. Thomas Cary. So, no, Facebook, I do not want to “be friends” with Mr. Thomas Cary.