One of the happiest days of my life was when I got my own library card. An even happier day was when Mom said I could cross Levick Street on my own, thus clearing the way to solo trips to the library. Yeah!
Books have always been a big part of my life, but they were becoming too big a part of my small apartment. For a few years, I donated books to the JCC seniors program. I haven't made the effort for a while, put off by the almost 2-hour round trip and the departure of the people I was close to from my stint as interim executive director of JFGO, in the same building.
So when I saw the young man from the Orange County Library in the lobby of the movie theater where Gisela and I saw The Peanuts Movie, I asked about donating books to the library. He told me all I had to do was show up at my local branch with books in hand. On Friday, that is just what I did with about a dozen books.
The young woman at the desk was so helpful and pleasant, I was inspired to go through all the books in my apartment to find more to donate. I spent about three hours this morning pulling books off shelves and out of cabinets and storage containers. After a thoughtful reorganization (all the fiction books in the red Chinese cabinet are in alphabetical order by author, for example), I have restored order to my personal library.
One surprise: I have a lot of poetry books, now nestled together on the first shelf in the computer alcove. I didn't think I had read that much poetry.
On Monday, I will head back to the SW Branch with about 30 more books to donate.
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