The Library

I've blogged about the Library before, but you're just going to have to bear with me (or stop reading!) because I'm going to do it again.

Ever since I was a little girl, I thought (no, I knew...this is true) that the Library was a marvelous invention. I was amazed that you could get books for FREE and all you had to do was bring them back on time. How much more wonderful could things get?

Today, I took several books back to the Library here. They were all badly overdue (I'm honestly not sure how late they were, but at least two or three weeks). I went into the children's book room to get something to read the first graders while the "Library lady" (as I always used to call the Librarian as a child) figured out how much I owed. It came to slightly over $5. And they let me check the books out again! The Library is such a forgiving, non punishment-oriented environment. No wonder I love it. It's also quiet, and my life has been so full of noise (meetings, lots of talk, and just competing "stuff") recently, that I enjoyed the brief getaway into peaceful silence.

In most towns, there are community libraries, and then there are schools which also have libraries. In Ocracoke, our library is called the "Ocracoke School/Community Library", and it is a resource shared by everyone in the village (regardless of whether they have any affiliation with the school), along with serving as the School library in every sense of the term.

There is a children's book (I can't think of the name) about libraries which features a picture of the former Ocracoke Library as an example of one of the smallest libraries in the US. If you have seen that book, or if you have seen the picture at this link, you might think we have a tiny library. That little building, however, is no longer the Ocracoke Library. The current facility is made up of a large open area and 3 additional rooms, one of which - the "North Carolina room" - is my favorite; there are many excellent, beautiful books in there about (you guessed it) the wonderful state of North Carolina (also my favorite). :)

Take advantage of the library nearest you, large or small.