I’m reading at the Rochester Art Center this Thursday night at 7 pm, as a part of their Free Thursdays, and again at the Rochester Public Library, as part of their Coffee House Author Series, on Sunday the 29th at 2 pm.  If you’re around…and interested, join me in discussing Eve!

John from the Rochester Public Library asked me, months ago, to write a piece about what libraries mean to me, and this month he’s published it in their newsletter.  I’ve asked permission to reprint here, because all in all, I think public libraries are the best thing since sliced bread.  Are you a fan, too?

Here goes:

Give me a library, and I’d say you’ve given me the best gift ever.  Definitely, I would choose it over chocolates (that’s saying a lot) or clothes or handy-dandy gadgets.  Libraries have always been enchanting places for me, a kind of mind-body travel that doesn’t require much budgeting or planning.

My first introduction to a library—in fact, the first I received a library card from—was the North Regional Library in Minneapolis, which we kids visited religiously every Saturday afternoon, once chores were done.  We four older kids (there were seven in all) would load up our scuffed-up Radio Flyer wagon with our plastic-covered books and pull them the seven short blocks on 30^th Avenue to our mecca.

The building itself was magical, because it was like an Egyptian tomb—a dark hush fallen over undiscovered treasures.  As we pushed our way through the black doors, our voices dropped; we knew it was a sacred place.  The children’s section was off to the left, surrounded by floor-to-ceiling windows, and had a three or four-tiered, bright orange (if I’m remembering correctly), carpeted amphitheater on which we lounged, perusing the shorter books we didn’t want to lug home.

Being the oldest, I would always search for books to take home to the younger ones, knowing I’d have to read to them.  I’d sit in the aisle, oblivious to everyone around me, chewing my fingernails down to aching nubs, unconscious of time, warmed by the sun’s rays, and haloed by the dancing dust motes around my head.  I’d stack books like Dandelion and Frog and Toad Are Friends and all of Bill Peet’s books in an unsteady, tottering pile next to me.  They were books that didn’t lose their charm after the first read.

Then, I’d choose one fairy tale anthology, two or three make-money-fast-with-crafts books, and several middle grade novels—Strawberry Girl or By the Shores of Silver Lake, or Johnny Tremain.  I was counting on each book carrying me far away from my breath-sucking life, away from the tension at home.  It was my drug of choice.

We were always tired and grumpy when we came to the library, but we always left in a semi-sweet, lethargic mood, given that we were carrying new thoughts and ideas and dreams home with us.  It was a lottery we could not lose.

Wherever I’ve lived, I’ve repeated this pattern.  Before finding out where the nearest grocery stores are, or where the most convenient gas station is, I have to find out where the library is.  It’s my lifeline.

I suppose it would come as no surprise then that the Rochester Public Library has played the same role for me, except more recently, it’s become a necessity while doing research for my novels.  When I first began to do research for Eve, in the spring of 2006, I spent one whole day up in Minneapolis and St. Paul going from one seminary library to another, one college library to another, thinking this was the only way I was going to acquire all the volumes on Adam and Eve that had ever been written.  It was on this trip I learned about the library’s interlibrary loan feature, and chagrined, I returned home to request all those books from my home computer.  And voilà!  Several days later, there they were, waiting for me at the library.  Now I had all the libraries at my fingertips.  I was in heaven.  Only, to be truthful, I felt a little guilty at having all those kind and generous library employees shelving and re-shelving all those books, just for me (because, let me tell you, I needed a whole lot of books!).

More recently, since we’ve adopted a 2 ½-year-old girl, the library has become a resource for simple board books that can entertain and teach her English.  She’s enamored with more than the books, of course—the fish tank, the ceiling hangings, the Christmas tree, the trails of wet slush going through the door—but in time, I think the library will become her special place, too.  She’ll be able to curl up in a chair and lose an afternoon, transported to some other place, some other time.  It’s the best way to learn about different cultures, various time periods, short of hands-on travel.  To give my daughter a love of books is the best gift I could ever give her—even though she does know the word “chocolate” now.

[Post image: Placard at Rochester Art Center]