This is my way of saying that we need spaces where there are a diverse array of books shelved by humans who are very good at their jobs but sometimes make silly mistakes. Computers make silly mistakes, but they don’t make that kind, and that kind is necessary. We need to be able to find things cataloged in a logical order, and both computers and librarians are good at that. Online stores are good at showing us exactly what we want so that we’ll buy it, and that’s good too. I buy books on Amazon as often as I can afford to. I wouldn’t do it if Amazon showed me Victor Hugo when I wanted Ann M. Martin. But the beauty of a library is having to physically place yourself inside a building stocked with books, some of which you want, some of which you don’t want, and some of which you didn’t know you wanted, and not knowing exactly where what you want is. It is necessary for a person’s education that they browse through books, select the right one most of the time, and sometimes read a completely different one on a whim or by accident. That’s how we expand our knowledge and our reading appetite instead of being drones who always follow the same path. People aren’t computers. People aren’t supposed to be very good at doing exactly one thing over and over and never getting any variety. People are supposed to grow and change, and finding a weird new book is one of the best ways to do that.
After my daughter, Rosie, was born, we were poor. We had very few friends. We didn’t have TV or a Netflix subscription; we didn’t have any money to buy books on Amazon. I didn’t really want to read anyway. I was too depressed. I had a horrendous case of post-partum depression and probably PTSD from my daughter’s disaster birth as well. I was miserable all the time, and it went on for years.
I took my daughter on the bus to the library.
I needed a distraction from being in my apartment, staring at the cracked walls. My daughter needed something to do. The library had a carpet with the continents of the earth printed on it in bright colors. It had a children’s section with a track and wooden trains, and one of those annoying twisted roller-coasters made of colored wire that babies can slide beads along. It had wooden puzzles with only three pieces. It had a dollhouse with stout wooden furniture and yarn dolls. It had board books that nobody minded babies chewing.
I would sit in the library staring at the walls, wishing I was dead. Rosie would sit on the colorful carpet, and play with the twisted wire roller coaster. She would push cars along the track. She would bang puzzle pieces together and chew board books.
Every so often, Misty the children’s librarian would come out of the activity room and ring the bell, and toddlers and their mothers would troop in for “Tot Time.” Some of those mothers and toddlers were poor like me; some were worse off and some were much happier, but we all gathered together for Tot Time. Tot Time was for everyone. I’d hold Rosie still on my lap and stare at the walls of the activity room. The librarian would pass out stickers, read picture books and lead the children in simple games. She’d organize a craft that the toddlers couldn’t really do, but they could smear the paper with crayons and feel proud of themselves. She thought of herself as preparing children for preschool, and maybe she was. I don’t know if Tot Time is an effective method to get children ready for preschool or not. I know that Tot Time was something for miserable people and happy people alike to do with their toddlers. The toddlers had a good time. The parents had the satisfaction of giving their toddlers a good time even though the rest of their lives might be in shambles. And it was free.
Online booksellers are good at all kinds of things. I’ve never seen an online bookseller which was good at taking a group of sad women and bored babies, and giving them something to do for fun to get them out of the house– let alone something potentially educational and absolutely free.
People need things to do outside of their houses for fun. That is as vital as vitamin c and exercise. Mental health is a kind of health, intrinsically connected to physical health, and part of mental health is having something to do for fun, somewhere to go and stare at walls other than your own, someplace that puts you in contact with other people who are similar to you and also different. Babies need colorful toys and Story Time for mental health. Mothers need to feel like they’ve provided for their children’s mental health, or the mothers’ mental health will get worse. These are necessary, and they’re not available from an online bookseller.
This is my way of saying that libraries are about far more than just getting a book you need quickly. An online store like Amazon can do that itself, if you’ve got the money, but libraries are better than online stores even if online stores were taxpayer-funded and free to use. Libraries are spaces for people who need spaces to go. They are places where people with children can meet for the children’s benefit and their own relief. They have people inside them whose job it is to help and teach, and those people make mistakes just often enough to be good for educating the public. Libraries are public spaces that educate everyone from babies up to grouchy old men, for free, in more ways than just turning up the book you wanted when you wanted it. They provide for mental health by providing fun things to do with no admission fee. They provide people with quiet places to read when they don’t want to drink a bottomless cup of diet Coke. They are a necessary part of communities for all of these reasons, and as far as tax dollars go they do it remarkably cheaply.
I never thought I’d have to say why the world needs public libraries. It seems so obvious to me. But if I were going to lay out the reasons why libraries are better than buying books online– well, these are a few of the reasons.
(image via Pixabay)
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