Childhood Memory: The Library

Who remembers going to the library as a kid?

For me, going to the library was one of the most fun times of my week that I genuinely looked forward to. Every Saturday afternoon, after my brother and I had finished doing all our chores, our mother would take us to the local library. Walking among the countless rows of shelves, the choices of books seemed delightfully endless. My brother and I would each leave with a tall stack which we’d finish reading in several days.

As I got older, I moved from picture books to novels and thus, checked out fewer books so I’d have more time to dive into longer-format stories. With my favorite genre being epic action and adventure, I fell in love with The Chronicles of Narnia, The Lord of the Rings, Charlie and the Chocolate Factory book trilogy and so many more, many times, revisiting and re-reading an entire series.

As a child of the 1980’s, I even read novelizations of some of my favorite films, such as the Star Wars trilogy and The Goonies. Thanks to the Indiana Jones films, I discovered a passion for learning about ancient civilizations and their mythologies. In the library, I would find books about Ancient Egypt, Ancient Greece, Ancient Rome and Ancient India.

The library was also a place where I sometimes did research for a school project or paper. Back then, we used what was called a micro-film projector. Once you found the listing of an old newspaper article pertaining to your subject, you'd place on order for that article with the librarian, who'd bring you a small container with a spool of film you had to first unwind, then carefully upload into a projector to view and read. Kids today growing up doing Google searches on their home computers or cell phones don’t know how easy they have it!

Visiting libraries in my college years, I discovered more favorite writers like author Anne Rice (Interview With a Vampire series, Witching Hour Chronicles), poet and short story writer Charles Bukowski and novelist Toni Morrison, to name a few.

Though I have read some e-books and have listened to audio books, there is nothing like the feeling of actually holding a physical book, then turning the pages as the words bring the story to life in my mind. For this reason, I suspect I will always visit libraries (and book stores) to enjoy this visceral experience.

I’m grateful to my amazing mom for fostering within me a love for reading books. I will forever cherish my childhood memories of exploring the local library where I first began discovering stories that magically transported me to other worlds.