Tuesday, October 13, 2009

I'm Trying To Write This

When the school year began, I decided that Tuesday afternoons would be dedicated to writing. So every week I take my laptop and head to the library after work. I spend a couple of blissful hours surrounded by books and imagine what my own books might look like on the shelves. Hopefully the day will come when I won't have to imagine.

I am sitting in the YA section as I type this. Allow me to describe my surroundings. To my right is a mother and two small children sitting on the bean bags. I think she is reading books to them in Russian. She's loud enough that I know she's translating "No David." To my left are two men having some kind of very loud discussion about a possible job. An interview? It's not for a job here at the library, by the way. Within the YA section are two women. The younger one is helping the older one pick out a book. The older one can't seem to control the volume of her voice. There is also a woman with a teen-age daughter, both of whom seem to lack any sense of the phrase "quiet voice." They're talking to each other two aisles apart.

Is it just me or are libraries supposed to be places of quiet? I guess I'll go home and write. Hopefully I won't be distracted by something silly like laundry or dishes or dusting.

OTHERS!

4 comments:

  1. Ack. Our library is so without quiet zones. Who, I ask you, puts a metal staircase RIght in the Middle of a Library? Madness.

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  2. Our library is never quiet. It is always full of children - mine included, but I have been able a couple of times to go upstairs and find some peace.

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  3. I love libraries, always have. From a very early age, I learned to appreciate the muted sounds of the library. That life around me was conducted in whispers allowed me to become absorbed in the pages of my book of choice. Without the sounds of crying, fighting, laughing, or talking disrupting my experience, I was able to exercise my imagination wholly. I could slip into the story I was reading because there was nothing to remind me that I wasn't among villains, heroes, monsters, or fairies. Thank goodness for the library!!

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