Library Love

If you know me even a little bit, you know that I love books, and reading. I have my own library at home, of which I am very proud. 

But I am also obsessed with public libraries. They are maybe the last place in our society where you can just be, and not be expected to pay money for the privilege. Just being able to borrow a book, (for free!), with a small little card issued to you (for free!) just based on proof of residency in the jurisdiction. Is there anything more civilized in this world?

I’m a proud patron of the Highgate Library, which is now part of the Chatham-Kent Public Library system. Sometimes, the holds shelf is made up entirely of books for me! 

I’ve been going to the Highgate Library since before kindergarten, probably. My mom had been a schoolteacher, so she taught us to read early, and instilled a love of reading into us. Highgate is a small community in Chatham-Kent, and the library seems to be perpetually on the chopping block for budgetary reasons. It has survived so far, so here’s to a long, long life!

CKPL has reciprocal agreements with neighbouring library systems. If you have a CKPL card, you can get library cards from Elgin, Essex, Lambton, St Thomas, and Middlesex. I became obsessed with getting all of them!

First was Elgin (a 15 minute drive from my house), next was Essex (45 minutes), then St Thomas (40 minutes). And then I found out that if you had an Elgin card, you could get a London card!  So London was my next acquisition (40 minutes).  Next up were Lambton (30 minutes), and then Middlesex (20 minutes). And I still have my Toronto card (ebooks only), so I am the proud holder of 8 library cards!  And amazingly enough, my wallet has an 8-cardholder section. It’s perfect!

The librarians in my libraries, overwhelmingly women, are a friendly and cheerful bunch. Many times, I have been buoyed by a conversation with a smiling library lady. These are my people.

As I was unemployed, I was going a bit stir crazy, so I undertook the project of visiting all 11 branches of the CKPL system (unfortunately, one of the branches was unexpectedly closed during the month I was doing my tour). And because one of my close friends is the CEO of the library (and because I’m a book nerd), I wrote a report on my tour, detailing each of my visits to the branches. But wait, there’s more!  The CKPL tour and report was so much fun, I did a tour of the Elgin system, along with an accompanying report. I didn’t checkout any books on these tours – I took pictures of the interesting titles I found in their respective non fiction sections (I’m a non fiction only girlie), and will be looking for them to be delivered to the Highgate Library. Gotta keep those circulation numbers up!  (Reports available upon request.) 😁

But alas, reality had to intrude. I had plans to do tours of my remaining libraries, but then I had to put new tires on my car, and Lily needed surgery, so I could no longer justify all that gas going to a silly little project. Maybe if I get a job, and time permits, I can pick it back up again.

During my completed tours of the CKPL and Elgin Library systems, I found 135 books to add to my TBR. There were already 265 books on my TBR shelves at home. I’ll have no problem reading them all, as long as I live to 173.