jean-lucien, lucynell, and myself all grew up in the same small town with the same public library. and thank christ it was a good one. jean-lucien and i didn't know lucynell until we accidentally met in high school many years later. but if i had any money, i'd bet she checked out a lot of the same books from that same library. i have no doubt she remembers the way it looked before they moved and renovated it. i can still walk the children's section in my sleep. and then there was entire world down those steep stairs. all the non-fiction. all the fiction. all the 'young adult' novelettes... all the 'grown-up' books. i cannot even begin to estimate all the hours i killed in that place. i even remember details... like the smell of the disrepaired public ladies' room, and the fact that the air conditioning units would become wet with condesation in the summertime. i remember the beanbag chairs in the children's section. i remember the sound the device made... (i think it was some sort of camera) when they checked out my parent's thick books upstairs. a sound not unlike a polaroid. the women behind the counter would quickly shove a book under there... then a flash of light, that sound, then off to the left, for the ride home. i never in my wildest dreams would've thought i'd work at that library... with many of those same books, in a different and more modern house. i've never loved a job the way i loved that one. but i left it standing at the altar. to this day, i don't know what i was thinking. i could've run that ship.
