Dear reader, if you're anything like me, you love to prowl the library. I can spend hours upon hours amongst the stacks of musty books. Dewey Decimal and Library of Congress systems, I've mastered both of them. The library is my playground and the shelves, sections, and card catalogs are my sliding-boards, swing-sets, and jungle gym. It disheartens me, I must say to look upon the current state of the library system. Card catalogs are becoming digital, run on computers. The books are torn and the dreaded lot of you would rather drink your latte at the "pay library" known as Barnes and Noble than give the community a bit of money to restore one of our greatest public resources. And worst of all, librarians are getting smaller and mousier.
When I was a boy, librarians were a rugged bunch of women. Strong shoulders from hoisting books, strong minds from reading the same, these ladies were the apple of every Chaucer-reading lad's eye. When these husky Helgas would strut down the aisles of my local library in Massachusetts, I had to do everything in my power to keep myself from following their sacred, muscular rumps. On the few occasions during which I lost control and either stared or accidentally touched, these librarian lasses would administer the naughtiest slap to my own behind. I say, I liked the pain!
Now we only have weak, atrophied mice women. Glasses weighing their faces down, machines and immigrant workers filing the books, they've become naught but heady waifs. They sullenly move about, answering questions and the getting out of the way. They browse the Internet and strain their eyes while searching their databases. In essence, these women are about as appealing as a room full of Pork Pony writers.
My place of employment is filled with a bunch of louts and my playground, the library, has become a place for the homely and frail to sulk.
Bah.
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