Books are all created equal.

Tonight the library was super slow. So I went around and was trying to pick stuff up and push in chairs to get out of there as fast as possible. I was cleaning up around the study rooms and I noticed a cup under one of the study tables. I picked it up and it was full of chicken bones. And the cup was covered in what must have been congealed grease or something. The creepy thing is that I have no idea how long that was there. It must have been a few days at least. Thanks, library patrons.

There was an interaction between a patron and a co-worker that made me think about how I was raised and how I was as an early reader. A woman came in with her three girls and they ended up picking up about 20 books or so. The girls were probably eight and under. She somehow knew one of my co-workers (I'm the youngest one working there and most of the women have children) so my co-worker was ringing her up. They came across the book Serendipity by Stephen Cosgrove and the mom told my co-worker, "I don't think I want that one... it looks weird." So my co-worker tossed the book on the floor and distracted the girl who picked it out so she wouldn't notice it not being checked out. Now, I remember reading these books when I was little. After searching through the author's book titles, I can remember more of his books than I thought.

I wanted to be sure that I wasn't censored like this as a child so I called Kathy who was our nanny when my sister and I were growing up. She's a really great friend of ours now and we stay in touch a lot. I asked her if she would ever not let us check books out. She said that we pretty much could check out anything that was at our reading level. When I told her about the exchange at my work, she thought it was kind of weird, too. Kathy also said that as long as it was from the kids section, we were allowed to check it out. If she wasn't sure about a book she would read through it with us but she never just looked at the cover and wouldn't let us get it.

When the patron left, I read through the book to see if I remembered it. It's a story about a sea serpent who doesn't know what she is so she travels the sea to try to find something like her. I think the moral of the story is basically that everyone can fit in somewhere, even if they look different. The serpent, Serendipity, even becomes a guardian of the seas. I think that kids should be able to read whatever they can. Especially when TV is much more prevalent in households than it was when I was growing up. Should kids really be taught to judge a book by its cover? As long as it's within their reading level, they should be able to read it, right? I was especially frustrated because the mom looked relatively young. Within ten years of my age I would guess. It just makes me think about how I would raise my kids, if I ever have them.