The Children's Library

The children’s section of our city library was in the basement with its own entrance, down gray cement stairs and through a wooden door. When I opened that heavy door, a little bell jangled a warning for the children’s librarian, Mrs. Peterson, nested behind the desk, directing eager, respectful kids to their chosen fantasies. As I remember, she was mostly round and soft, white and gray. Her face pleated when she smiled and she smiled most of the time, unless you disturbed the hushed quiet of her kingdom.

The children’s library was dark, low ceilinged with that musty, rich smell of crowded books and oak bookcases stuffed with mellow-colored covers in dark burgundy, navy, moss green. Oak card files, chest high tops, covered with heavy glass, outfitted with pencil holder, library stamp and return cards, low tables with ladder-back chairs, dark patterned carpet and Mrs. Peterson’s executive desk, in the place of command.

Once a year she brought in her dolls, displaying the extensive collection around the shadowy interior. Many years later when I visited the library, long after I quit the children’s section and there was a new library building, the dolls were on display. She had bequeathed the collection to the library in a very generous gift, but nothing like the gift of reading she fostered in so many children.

My mother had three voracious readers and she sought help from an expert. Mrs. Peterson always knew exactly where to find the books that would suit each of our interests. Even mine.
Reading was important to my parents, though they never said so in so many words. Not like I did and still do with my own children and grandchildren, but they read to us every night and made a trip to the library every two weeks to check out books for their own pleasure. Often there wasn’t enough money for luxuries, but there were always books, borrowed, bought second-hand, or given as gifts. How lucky I was.

By the time I was eight, I was reading just about everything. If I found a subject I liked, I’d read through ever book I could find. I remember reading through the whole shelf and a half of horse stories the summer I was twelve and horse-crazy. The next year it was boy/girl stories and Mrs. Peterson knew exactly what I was looking for and where to find them.

The year after that, when my mother asked for advice on books for me, Mrs. Peterson stood up and folded her hands over her soft belly. “I think she’s ready to go upstairs.”

As simple as that. I never thought much about Mrs. Peterson, after that, or what she meant in my life. She, most likely, didn’t think much of that shy, dish-water blonde girl who went from horse-crazy to boy-crazy in one short year either, but that little girl wonders now, about her dedication to books and reading and children. That small way she gave so much. Not a bad legacy. Not a bad thing to remember and honor in some way.