The Card

         

          What would you do for a library card?  I grew up in Arcadia which had a beautiful library that I imagined looked like the White House.  Growing up with three brothers, I soon discovered that I was the only one who actually liked going to the library.  My family did not buy books.  We went to the library.  Now, we “went” to the library, but I was usually the only one looking for books.  While searching for books that held scripts (I loved putting on back yard productions with my brothers and neighborhood kids in the summer) and Laura Ingalls Wilder books, my brothers waited with my mom in the lobby.  For me, a library card was a passport, and I put it to good use every summer.  I was a girl and a nerd, and I carried a library card.  

            Well, my three children have been raised in Claremont.  In Claremont, owning a library card is not just for nerds, because in Claremont, obtaining a library card is a rite of passage.  Claremont is known as the “city of trees and PhD’s.”  Now, while most citizens do not have their PhD, they do have a library card.  This is the same town that has a “What Are You Reading?” feature in the local paper, and promotes an annual reading program called, “On the Same Page” in which citizens all commit to reading the same book (participation is noted by a yard sign featuring the title of that year’s reading selection) every fall.  Only in Claremont will the Friends of the Claremont Library annual used-book sale be one of the must-attend events of the year.   

            Claremont’s library is tucked in the center of the Village, with shops and City Hall on one side, and the Claremont Colleges on the other.  Across the street from the post office and down the street from Some Crust bakery, the library was always on the way to some essential errand.  At my children’s elementary school, the most anticipated field trip in 3rd grade was a three mile walking field trip to the library for a reading presentation.  And for the lucky few who brought their parent-signed application form, library cards were obtained.  Now, this was a field trip with a purpose.  I have chaperoned these trips several times.  A student who was able to flash a new library card was as envied as a teenager with a new driver’s license.  Library cards not only allowed access to a world of books contained within a building, but admission into a city culture that made books a means of connection for its citizens. 

            In a world that provides instant electronic access to books and reading materials through e-Books, Kindles, and EBSCO, my local library is still a destination of choice for my children in the summer.  Home from college, my daughters will either ride a skateboard, bike, or walk to the library.  Yesterday, I found on the kitchen counter the library card for my daughter, Sarah.  It holds her “big girl” signature from the 3^rd grade.  Eleven years later, that signature still speaks to me of the day that she walked a three mile round trip for that card, and the pride that she felt at becoming a card-carrying citizen of Claremont.