A celebration of public libraries

I love books. I love the smell of them and the feel of them and the way a good book can help you be entirely in another world while entirely in this one, all at the same time.

When I was growing up, the closest public library was about a mile away. It felt long. We’d walk, pulling one of those wheeled shopping carts behind us. We’d fill it up with books for the month. At home, my mother would make a list of them, confiscate those cardboard stamp cards at the back of each book and put them all in a neat stack along with the list. Losing one of the cardboard stamp cards came with a substantial fine, and we would definitely have lost several had it not been for this precaution. At the end of the month, we’d go hunting for the books, many of which inevitably would have found mysterious hiding spots all over the apartment.

I moved so much throughout my 20s that I didn’t really use libraries beyond those at my various schools at that point.

And then I had a child. When we first moved to Brooklyn, the public library had a tiny branch only 2 blocks away. The laundromat we used was halfway there. My Saturday ritual with my daughter became commuting between laundromat and library. I want to tell myself her love of books comes from that time, but I don’t actually know. In my memory it was mostly frustrating: never enough time to read, always mind on the laundry and chores. But of course she wouldn’t necessarily have felt that: she was 2.

These days, I am returning to public libraries as a sanctuary for meetings, study-time, and internet access on road-trips. There is always space, always support for doing work that requires quiet or isolation, and it is always shelter from the elements. When I dropped my daughter off at college in September last year, I took a work-call from a public library somewhere between North Adams and Boston. This past week, we visited Stratford, CT, for the same reason.

I keep thinking: this is community. This is what I would like my tax dollars to pay for: a quiet, safe, sheltered space for learning and thought, open to all.