I made a trip to the local library yesterday, something I'd been
meaning to do since we moved. Libraries in general are an amazing
but underused resource.
My earliest memories of libraries were from my hometown in
Massachusetts. That was in the 70s, when card catalogs ruled and the
giant bookstore was non-existent. I still remember the smell of the
books, the feel of flipping through the card catalogs, and the signs
for the summer reading contests. I spent hours perusing the shelves,
satisfying my curiosity on everything from chess to the occult.
Today my interests are more targeted, of course, but I still enjoy
browsing the stacks. My goal is to improve my French, and it turned
out that the librarian was a former teacher of French as a second
language, so I got some great suggestions. What was nice was that
the library was busy, this during a weekday afternoon. There were
children who had ridden their bikes to the library, and adults
perusing the magazines and newspapers.
The library itself is small, still there are about 40k books
(according to the library website). Most are French, but there is a
small English section. I picked up two books on my 'want to read
again' list, Foundation and Dune, both in French. So far I've
started to read Foundation. It is slow-going, and I have to resist
the urge to look up words I don't know. I try to guess their meaning
from context, which works sometimes.
I asked the librarian about e-books, she said they did not offer
any, that she prefers real books. I thought that an interesting
stand for a librarian in 2017, but then afterwards I thought some
more about it and realized she most certainly prefers to see people
in the library. If the library purchased e-books, attendance might
drop. I can't say I blame her, I think children especially should be
exposed to libraries and real books well before they get a chance to
stare at a kindle. The experience of seeing all the books, of being
able to pick them up and skim through them is not reproducible in
electronic form.
