The only thing that you absolutely have to know, is the location of the library. ~ Albert Einstein
I’m going to have to stay away from one of my favorite places in the world. I never thought I’d say this, but right now I have too…many…books…to read. And we’re heading into finals at school, which I should be working on, so naturally I’m blogging instead.
I love being in the Seattle Public Library, and I’m almost that fond of browsing the virtual stacks. Ooh, this looks good, and my friend liked this one, and this sounds interesting, “place hold,” clickety-clickety-click. Now it seems like everything I reserved has come available at the same time, and how do I say no to a book? I can’t. I even went to the drugstore next door and bought something I didn’t need just to get a shopping bag to lug all the books home in.
And then there’s the TBR pile of books owned, not borrowed. Some time ago I picked up Margaret Atwood’s Alias Grace and I’d like to actually read it. My cousin just sent me a copy of A Brother’s Price by Wen Spencer, a new author for me. I also treated myself to a replacement copy of Anne Tyler’s Dinner at the Homesick Restaurant, my all-time favorite comfort book that I stupidly left in storage in Nevada, not knowing how much I would miss that torn and frayed bunch of paper that’s been read forty-eleven times.
And then there are all the e-books I’ve checked out. Oh, and final papers and stuff.
Don’t suggest just releasing the hold so I can come back to it later. I have this certain selfishness with books. I have to have all of the books. If I give it back, even only for now, I might not get it back again. Unthinkable.
I don’t even trust myself to go to the library just to study, because I always end up on the top floor in the reading room, curled up with a cup of hot chocolate (because all the best libraries have a Chocolati Cafe) and a book, of course, with the light falling on me and on everything around me like it does nowhere else, because nowhere else has this precise latitude and longitude, creating just the right angle for light to pour into these windows, which also exist nowhere else.
I’ve always liked old books, old places, old buildings, so I don’t know why this ultra-modern bit of deconstructivism appeals to me so much. Perhaps there is a smidge of sophistication in me after all. Here’s my library for you to enjoy too:
99 Monkeys 