I happened to take a day off work yesterday and so was reminded of another rural service we receive, and often overlook: the mobile library, which arrived after lunch and parked outside the post office.This particular vehicle is my own personal idea of heaven - a large van stuffed full of books which comes to my house on a regular basis. Even better, the driver knows his customers so well he can recommend new books for them to try and make sure that there is a good selection aboard to suit their tastes.
The van is equipped with a lift to help those with achy knees and wobbly legs clamber in and out again safely. The less mobile readers rise in a stately fashion to the van's hallowed interior, and later descend clutching their new armful of reading material. As the van only comes every three weeks, you may need to take quite a pile of books away; and if you can't manage the next scheduled visit, you can send a message to have the loan extended, or ask someone to drop them off for you.
When I do get the chance to go to the mobile library, it's always a good time to meet with the neighbours who are also around that day, and to catch up on some gossip. Our latest entertainment is the possible sighting of a large black animal, which some claim was a puma, while others subscribe to the view that it was Hamish, a substantial feline who lives at the top of the village. I have to admit to being in the Hamish camp myself, but I'm happy to be proved wrong.
Back to the library van though. This is a job I would love to have. As a child I wanted to be a librarian (based on my view of the very nice ladies who helped me find books for school projects). The idea of being able to potter around the countryside in a van full of the latest bestsellers and classic volumes appeals to me immensely. I like reading books, and I like talking to people about reading books - or just talking!
I'm sure it's not quite as much fun as it sounds, but it is one of two ambitions not yet achieved, although it is more likely to be fulfilled than the other ambition, which is to go into space and see the world from outside and the stars in all their glory. If I could go in a library-spaceship, all the better.
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1 comment:
Years ago our very rural area of North Dakota was served by a mobile library. We have a nice library now; not sure if remote parts of North Dakota still have rural library. (Incidentally, North Dakota has the longest school bus routes in the United States.)
Anyway, you might enjoy seeing some of the wildlife in my backyard -- about a 100 miles south of where I grew up -- but in North Dakota, that's close. The parks remind me of the parks in Yorkshire (Yorkshire Dales, Moors) -- their remoteness, their wind, -- but the wildlife a lot different.
http://rangernathan.blogspot.com/2009/03/north-unit-first-sign-of-spring.html
This is a blog by a park ranger. Buffalo/bison evolved to handle deep snow, so they should have handled this winter of deep snow well; I'm not so sure how other wildlife has done.
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