Works for me Wednesday: Library Lady

I’m obsessed with the smell of libraries. Books and bindings, scotch tape and glue: the smell of words, possibilities. I grew up with that scent, the dust of yellowed hardcovers clinging to my hands. I have a very distinct memory of climbing out of the car at six or seven clutching the books I’d taken out, my next door neighbor chuckling from her front yard at the enormous stack of paperbacks that obscured my face. I couldn’t help it: I needed to borrow that many. Otherwise I went through them too fast.

 

Luckily, at the library it didn’t matter.

 

I’m a fast, hungry reader, and it’s rare for me to repeat a book. It would be a waste of money—and paper—for me to buy books new, or even used. When it comes to living simply and saving money, I can’t beat the library as a resource. Books, movies, magazines: why wouldn’t you want to get your hands on all of this stuff for free?

 

I’ve always had a library card in the city where I live, but last year I started commuting about an hour each way to work. I got lazy about the library—often it was closed by the time I got there, or I’d put off returning books because I didn’t feel like going out of my way on the long trip to my office. I got hit with fines, which was irritating, and soon I wasn’t using the library very much at all.

 

So a couple of weeks ago, I stopped by the library in the town where I worked to see if I could use my office address to get a card there—turns out it was no problem. A block from the subway station, it’s super convenient, and the collection is fantastic. I’m a library lady again.

 

And that works for me.