For Sarah, who made my heart expand 7 times its girth this day

So, my friend Sarah, whom I met in Algebra class when I was a freshman and she was a sophomore in high school (I failed the class, she went on to geometry... I took it the next year and passed, again at community college and got an A! but this I credit to my awesome teacher... but enough about my sorted academic history, a confusing hodgepodge of F's and A's-- vacillating between brilliance and failure... eh... joking...)... so my friend Sarah, inexplicably enjoyed reading my blog (she claims) despite the liberties I take-- rambling and excessive asides. Besides being beautiful and one smart cookie, she is also very kind.
So, since I, as most people seem to these days do (http://www.slate.com/id/2213740/), enjoy talking about myself, I will continue the blog! And maybe adventures will follow, if I am so lucky ;)
So, I am back at home, working at the food co-op again and loving it very much. There is the most amazing confluence of good people in that place. It's wonderful. Bicycling, hanging out with my parents and my dog, seeing my incredible friends... today I want to write about the library.
Yesterday I went to the library and checked out many books. Here is the list, attempting to write it in the order selected(I like it):
The Bhaghavad-Gita: As It Is, translated by His Divine Grace Bhaktivedanta Swami Prabhupada
Hinduism edited by Louis Renou
Becoming a U.S. Citizen: A Guide to the Law, Exam, and Interview
(The order becomes a little hazy after this)
War Law by Michael Byers
A Short History of Nearly Everything by Bill Bryson
Don’t Know Much About The Universe by Kenneth C. Davis
Collapse by Jared Diamond
The World is Flat by Thomas L. Friedman
Hippie by Barry Miles
Ravelstein by Saul Bellow (definitely picked last)

A fine list! I want to rub my hands together with relish at the sight of the books splayed my bed. I slept next to the pile last night (really, a double bed is too big for a person of my size, not that I’m complaining), giving new meaning to the line my mother wrote in my 6th grade graduation present (a copy of my then favorite book Little Women) “One is never lonely with books as friends,” or something to that effect. Indeed, I was a lonely child (a weirdo), with a love for reading. I read constantly, manuals in the car, fiction on the playground… when I would go into my orthodontist’s office they would always ask me what I was currently perusing, and I would give them an excited account of the latest from the babysitter’s club (people are so patient with children). I think I read 50 books one summer (a large number to me, but maybe not to some folks) when I was in elementary school. As I adjusted socially, and got a little lazier, my love of reading tempered. Even now, I feel a little guilty for the escapism of fiction. Shouldn’t I be learning something? How do I know so shockingly little about politics?
But here is the sad truth about the list above. I doubt that I will finish two, if even one of those books. I get so excited at the prospect of learning… to the point that I daydream about how accomplished I will feel after the brain soak that is supposed to be occurring… my mind wanders and I forget to read. I also become so preoccupied with the life that I can’t focus. I swear, I would have been a much better student in college had I forsaken boys (but no one wants to hear about that)… and television was my vice in high school…
Don’t you love the library though? The promise… the free stuff. I have never been deprived, but I have also never had very much money, so to go to a place and consistently get as much of what I want, with no negative consequences… it’s a dream! Music of all varieties, so much information… you would think I would feel similarly about the internet by that logic, but I am mainly unenthusiastic, although I do appreciate it’s easy convenience.
In Seattle, on my days off I would make a little circuit. The donut shop (http://www.toppotdoughnuts.com/ aka heaven!), the library, the grocery store… actually multiple trips to multiple grocery stores… I love grocery stores… seriously. But perhaps the ode to produce will be written another day…
So, I don’t really have an ending to this. I’ve lost my steam. I love you.
Sarah works at the library. Isn't that cool?