Doors Close, Windows Open

Baby Steps

"The Journey of a Thousand Miles begins with a Single Step"

After class, I headed to the library.  It was where I remembered it, but doubled in size. The metal-framed glass doors had been replaced by thick, hand-carved oak doors at least fourteen feet tall, looking like they might lead into an old Spanish fortress.  A high-polished stone floor replaced the well-trodden and much-soiled low-pile brown carpet.  Best of all, the metal turn-styles at the entrance were gone.  No more getting the straps of my backpack caught in the chrome bandit.

To the left of the foyer, a modern, cushy lounging area with vending machines invited students to relax and mingle.  The couches and chairs were occupied by students abuzz in low-humming conversations, broken by occasional bursts of light giggles.  On the walls surrounding the lounge, promising student art work added punch and color to the atrium.  Where the art work ended and the books began, a sign stated "No food, drinks or speaking beyond this point."  This assured the heavy silence that libraries cultivated within their hallowed halls.  To the right and directly across from the lounge (no accident to be sure), stood the reference librarian behind a broad mahogany semi-circle desk.  Her face was furrowed pensively as she flipped through a stack of papers.  I got in front of her and asked, "Pardon me, ma'am, but could you help me find something?"

"Certainly dear, watch-a looking for?" she replied with an inviting smile as she looked up from red-frame bifocals linked to her neck by a wildly swirled beaded chain.  Though her pale crepe paper face was deeply etched with the lines that time carves in exchange for giving us a birthday year, her azure eyes sparkled with the intensity I remembered in my Aunt Mary when she was deeply focused.  This was a comforting sight.

"Books..."  I pulled the course syllabus for her to see. She set aside the paperwork in a neat, precise pile and grabbed my syllabus.  The red frames were rested at the end of a long, narrow, pointed nose that looked as if it had been designed for just this purpose.

"Flatland - by Edwin Abbott? And this other one here, by..."

"Mm-hum, Oh yes... you're in Hal's class.  That'll be interesting.  Good thing you got here early, I probably got copies. Alrighty, come on, I'll show you where to find 'em." 

I followed the zig-and-zag of the silk skirt patterned with red, yellow and green geometric shapes.  If external dress reflected an inner self, there was a cheerful girl trapped inside an old lady's body.  Our determined walk halted suddenly in between seven-foot shelves crammed with books.

"Here we go, Flatland.  Oh, you'll like this one" as she reached up to the second highest shelf and handed me a thin paperback book.

"This skinny old thing?" I asked incredulously.  Looked like about ninety pages.

"You know what they say about judgin' a book by its cover... or, by its size."

"Yes ma'am, I reckon."

"You want to find these other books too while we're at it?"  I nodded yes, and within minutes, Abbott's Flatland, Frankl's Man's Search for Meaning, and Jung's The Undiscovered Self were in hands.

"That'll do you for now.  You come back for the others.  Do you want to learn how to find these books by yourself?"  I did.  She sat me down at a terminal in the computer section and showed me how it worked.  Within seconds, a library map and book locations were displayed. What would have taken twenty minutes twenty years ago, now took about two.   

"Thanks for your time; I'm, well, a bit rusty at all this," I said, gathering my things.

"You a student?"