{"id":43172,"date":"2021-12-17T22:50:08","date_gmt":"2021-12-18T05:50:08","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/beloved-everything-store-closing-its-doors-after-35-years-in-cortez\/"},"modified":"2026-03-31T03:12:06","modified_gmt":"2026-03-31T09:12:06","slug":"beloved-everything-store-closing-its-doors-after-35-years-in-cortez","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/beloved-everything-store-closing-its-doors-after-35-years-in-cortez\/","title":{"rendered":"Beloved \u2018everything\u2019 store closing its doors after 35 years in Cortez"},"content":{"rendered":"

\"Rocky
Rocky Mountain One Stop is closing its doors after 35 years.<\/span>Kala Parkinson<\/span><\/figcaption><\/figure>\n<\/p>\n

For Donna Livengood, it\u2019s been strange to experience the ever-changing \u2013 and sometimes cyclical \u2013 nature of music listening.<\/p>\n

For 35 years, she\u2019s watched people from all walks of life \u2013 including, one time in 1991, Jon Bon Jovi, who was on a cross-country motorcycle trip \u2013 peruse the shelves of her store, Rocky Mountain One Stop.<\/p>\n

Now, she\u2019s bidding goodbye to this era, with the last day to stroll her store\u2019s mix of odds and ends slated for Dec. 24.<\/p>\n

<\/p>\n

\u201cIt\u2019s becoming a little more real as we get closer, and so it\u2019s a lot of emotions,\u201d she said. \u201cWe\u2019\u2019re definitely going to miss it. I\u2019ll miss the people and just being here every day.\u201d<\/p>\n

Rocky Mountain One Stop first opened on Elm Street in Cortez on April 19, 1986, before moving to Main Street and eventually landing at its current location, at 330 N. Broadway.<\/p>\n

Near closing time Thursday, and between assisting a steady stream of customers, she reminisced on her \u201cone stop\u201d venture and on her time there, the sun setting beyond the shop\u2019s graffiti-style exterior.<\/p>\n

Changing of the times<\/div>\n

In a now bygone era, Livengood placed orders for CDs and vinyls once a week \u2013 back when distributors issued thick catalogs every few months listing artists and their albums.<\/p>\n

At one point, Livengood had 7,000 vinyls in stock and thousands more CDs.<\/p>\n

\"A
A sign that hung in Rocky Mountain One Stop\u2019s original location, fashioned by Livengood\u2019s friend, Larry David.<\/span>Kala Parkinson<\/span><\/figcaption><\/figure>\n<\/p>

When The Journal <\/em>visited her curio shop, she had music playing from her computer \u2014 but only because her stereo was down.<\/p>\n

To clarify, Livengood isn\u2019t a streaming service subscriber.<\/p>\n

She prefers full sound, the kind you can\u2019t get by plugging headphones into your phone or playing your personal playlist in your car.<\/p>\n

She recalled borrowing her daughter\u2019s car for a few days and inserting CDs.<\/p>\n

When her daughter drove her car again, the music immediately blaring on full blast, she asked Livengood, \u201cWhat did you do to my car?\u201d<\/p>\n

She hadn\u2019t known it could sound like that.<\/p>\n

And although record players have experienced a recent resurgence, as they do every few years, Livengood said, she values the record players with high-quality needles. They cost at least $60, she said.<\/p>\n

\u201cYou\u2019ll hear things you never knew were in there. You\u2019ll hear different instruments, and you\u2019ll hear the real music,\u201d she said.<\/p>\n

Despite modern trends, Livengood isn\u2019t conforming to contemporary music-listening practices.<\/p>\n

\u201cIt\u2019s all streaming, it\u2019s all digital \u2013 digital compressed music,\u201d she said. \u201cYou had this big, full, rich, warm sound and compressed it.\u201d<\/p>\n

Although people aren\u2019t hauling vinyls around anymore, she said listeners simply aren\u2019t treated to the same listening experience typical of decades past.<\/p>\n

The store\u2019s shelves reflect Livengood\u2019s hold on music tradition, stacking sounds that span the last century.<\/p>\n

More than music<\/div>\n

The store didn\u2019t stop at music.<\/p>\n

Described as an \u201ceverything\u201d store on its website, the establishment has been a treasure trove of sorts, offering music, jewelry, instruments, music sheets, incense, board games, playing cards and other knickknacks.<\/p>\n

Thus, the expansive and all-encompassing term \u201cOne Stop\u201d graced the store\u2019s name.<\/p>\n

Livengood affectionately referenced her husband, Matt, who has been with the business for 22 years.<\/p>\n

He was shopping in her store when they met.<\/p>\n

\u201cAll I can say is the community has been awesome to us,\u201d he said. \u201cWe\u2019ve made it a long time, and it\u2019s all because of their support.\u201d<\/p>\n

The couple agrees that this closing chapter is bittersweet.<\/p>\n

\u201cIt\u2019s kind of sad, but at the same time, it feels kind of good to be doing something different,\u201d Matt said.<\/p>\n

An avid player of trading card game \u201cMagic the Gathering,\u201d he\u2019s helped to mold the store into somewhat of a hub for fellow enthusiasts.<\/p>\n

Hosting \u201cMagic\u201d events at the store and traveling to others, Livengood reflected on frequent late nights, including some that would spiral through weekends. At one point, the store would host prerelease parties beginning at midnight.<\/p>\n

\u201cThey think about \u2018Magic\u2019 24 hours a day,\u201d Livengood said of the people she affectionately called \u201cnerds.\u201d<\/p>\n

No matter a customer\u2019s reason for entering the store \u2013 music, magic or otherwise \u2013 Livengood has always curated it to be a \u201csafe space\u201d \u2013 one where everyone felt comfortable, she said.<\/p>\n

Interest in the store became generational. Livengood was always amused when she\u2019d see middle school-age children bringing their parents into the store, thinking that they were showing them something new. Many of those parents \u201cused to hang out in here all the time,\u201d she said.<\/p>\n

\u201cIt\u2019s a great place to be able to come and just get a random thing that you need on the spur of the moment,\u201d said Ole Bye, purchasing a Christmas gift for his friend.<\/p>\n

He preferred buying drumsticks and guitar strings there, rather than online.<\/p>\n

The store is \u201cniche,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n

\u201cIt\u2019s Rocky Mountain One Stop,\u201d Livengood simply said, when asked to classify the store.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

reflects on music evolution and generations of customers <\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":43173,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[],"tags":[431,21,28,167,559,29],"naviga_topic":[],"class_list":["post-43172","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","tag-business-general","tag-cortez","tag-headlines","tag-local-news-lead","tag-music","tag-newsletter"],"acf":[],"author_name":"dh_admin","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/43172","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=43172"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/43172\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":85602,"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/43172\/revisions\/85602"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/43173"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=43172"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=43172"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=43172"},{"taxonomy":"naviga_topic","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/naviga_topic?post=43172"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}