When in doubt, go to the library
"Where can I work that has free wifi?" My husband asks me this as he's trying to tap on his tablet screen with two small, LOUD girls climbing on and over him. Thus I initiate Dallas into the wonder that is our city library.
The library is my safe place, my calm place, the place where one part of me becomes all the way alive. In the library I'm more me. The woods and wild beaches and the grocery store early in the morning and late at night also do this for me. We're all a weird hodge podge, I tell you.
I first wandered into the Everett city library when I was waiting for a bus transfer at the old bus depot down on Hoyt and Hewitt my first year of college. It's an old, beautiful building. You used to walk in on the dark, office grade carpet, your footfalls muffled, then through a turnstile and you look up and the ceiling has vaulted and there are skylights at the top and a giant bank of windows at the end of the main room with a beautiful, industrial view of the Port of Everett. The turnstile is gone now but the simple grandiosity is still there. I wandered the two stories that first time, my arms ladened with book after book only to be turned down because I didn't live in city limits, (my library is exclusive, just like me).
Eight years later and a year into our marriage, Dallas and I bought a townhouse in downtown Everett. It was bigger than our first house and even had a small yard. But the biggest thing this house had going for it? It was in the city limits. As soon as I had a utility bill to prove my residence, I marched myself into the library and got a card, sealing my love affair with my city library for good.
When my dog misbehaved, I went to the library. When I found out I was pregnant I went to the library...a lot. The Internet is amazing but there's nothing like a big stack of books, full testaments of authority on subjects that I can flip through. When I don't know what to do, I can at least go to the library and feel like I'm doing something. I go to the library when I feel sad and alone. For some reason, when I'm surrounded by row after row of words that other people poured their souls into; I'm not alone anymore. In the library I'm rich, embraced by knowledge and possibility.
A while back, my mother-in-law came over just to give me a break from my babies. With nothing planned and nothing that needed doing, I went to my library, grabbed a bunch of magazines and settled cozily into a nook somewhere on the second floor. The minutes ticked by and with each flip of a glossy page, I felt pieces of my self dropping into place again. Motherhood means giving so much of yourself away, so constantly that it's so easy to have nothing left for you by the end of the day.
Now, I take my girls to my library and it's become our library. We have a ritual as we walk in. First comes the whispered admonitions of how you behave in our library. "Use quiet voices, no running. DO NOT RUN AWAY FROM ME, LUCY!" Then, as we round the corner, each girl must drink from the water fountain. Next we visit the fish in the aquarium that forms part of the children's section entrance. The books form layers of an onion with a play area in the center. The girls go to the doll house and various puzzles and well loved toys before picking out books. They bring stacks of hard and soft covered books and overload the reusable shopping bag I've brought just for that reason. We read a few books out loud. We make our way to the check out line. About half the time we have to stop into the office and pay a late fee, then while the librarians carefully check out each book, (speed and efficiency is not in a library vocabulary manual), my blood pressure rises while I keep my girls who are DONE from running around, climbing and generally embarrassing me with their antics while we wait. The library with children isn't my sanctuary but it's my gift to them.
Because my girls won't be eager, smiling souls trailing me into our library forever and I know my special place will be waiting for me when they've stopped holding my hand for safety and asking me what this book says. Maybe my library, our library, will become their special place, too.
The library is my safe place, my calm place, the place where one part of me becomes all the way alive. In the library I'm more me. The woods and wild beaches and the grocery store early in the morning and late at night also do this for me. We're all a weird hodge podge, I tell you.
I first wandered into the Everett city library when I was waiting for a bus transfer at the old bus depot down on Hoyt and Hewitt my first year of college. It's an old, beautiful building. You used to walk in on the dark, office grade carpet, your footfalls muffled, then through a turnstile and you look up and the ceiling has vaulted and there are skylights at the top and a giant bank of windows at the end of the main room with a beautiful, industrial view of the Port of Everett. The turnstile is gone now but the simple grandiosity is still there. I wandered the two stories that first time, my arms ladened with book after book only to be turned down because I didn't live in city limits, (my library is exclusive, just like me).
Eight years later and a year into our marriage, Dallas and I bought a townhouse in downtown Everett. It was bigger than our first house and even had a small yard. But the biggest thing this house had going for it? It was in the city limits. As soon as I had a utility bill to prove my residence, I marched myself into the library and got a card, sealing my love affair with my city library for good.
When my dog misbehaved, I went to the library. When I found out I was pregnant I went to the library...a lot. The Internet is amazing but there's nothing like a big stack of books, full testaments of authority on subjects that I can flip through. When I don't know what to do, I can at least go to the library and feel like I'm doing something. I go to the library when I feel sad and alone. For some reason, when I'm surrounded by row after row of words that other people poured their souls into; I'm not alone anymore. In the library I'm rich, embraced by knowledge and possibility.
A while back, my mother-in-law came over just to give me a break from my babies. With nothing planned and nothing that needed doing, I went to my library, grabbed a bunch of magazines and settled cozily into a nook somewhere on the second floor. The minutes ticked by and with each flip of a glossy page, I felt pieces of my self dropping into place again. Motherhood means giving so much of yourself away, so constantly that it's so easy to have nothing left for you by the end of the day.
Now, I take my girls to my library and it's become our library. We have a ritual as we walk in. First comes the whispered admonitions of how you behave in our library. "Use quiet voices, no running. DO NOT RUN AWAY FROM ME, LUCY!" Then, as we round the corner, each girl must drink from the water fountain. Next we visit the fish in the aquarium that forms part of the children's section entrance. The books form layers of an onion with a play area in the center. The girls go to the doll house and various puzzles and well loved toys before picking out books. They bring stacks of hard and soft covered books and overload the reusable shopping bag I've brought just for that reason. We read a few books out loud. We make our way to the check out line. About half the time we have to stop into the office and pay a late fee, then while the librarians carefully check out each book, (speed and efficiency is not in a library vocabulary manual), my blood pressure rises while I keep my girls who are DONE from running around, climbing and generally embarrassing me with their antics while we wait. The library with children isn't my sanctuary but it's my gift to them.
Because my girls won't be eager, smiling souls trailing me into our library forever and I know my special place will be waiting for me when they've stopped holding my hand for safety and asking me what this book says. Maybe my library, our library, will become their special place, too.
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