Morning in the Library

December is my favourite month, because it really boosts your imagination to try to maintain healthy common sense when the Christmas hysteria attacks from all possible places. So saving myself from the insanity, I make my way to the Local library.

It is a humble place, probably not much larger than somebody's living room. Its obvious target visitors are at the age from 0 to 10. The kid's section (more than half of the premise plus half of the remaining half, not to mention that half of the remaining quarter was used as a wardrobe and general storage area) is a shoe-free environment, with padded safe floor and vast diversity of entertainment options for kids that need more time to show interest to the books. Luckily, it is not forbidden for adults and I take off my shoes, pull out from my back pack the thick, comfy socks with reindeers and snowflakes and put them on, take my thermos bottle of tea and the porcelain cup which says "you are my angel" and there I go towards one of the puffs in the corner that kids don't seem to be too interested in. Its location is fantastically strategic, I realise, when I sit on it, as I can actually put my beverage on a high shelf and keep away from children. My favourite situation when you didn't plan anything, yet it seem like you have planned in utter detail.

So I take the book I chose in my lap, open it randomly and sink into a scene.

I saw it in a book shop a few days before, as it was placed such that it was impossible not to be seen. Also here, it stood on the first-thing-you-see-when-you-enter shelf with the inevitable "14 days only"-sticker reminding you that you are not alone in this world. My immediate reaction to the sticker was "I am going to read it in 14 minutes" and I am still not sure whether it was arrogance or intuition.

Anyway, I read the first scene I stumbled upon which was about kids going to church in ridiculously official outfit and flipped over. 'Linear plots, that's what every book needs' I suddenly remembered the words of one of my colleagues, while another one was sharing the not-be-able-to-sleep experience he had with a psycho-thriller with medieval subplot. Well, this one seems to meet his criteria, as 50ish pages after the church the kids have gone to university and some of them experience a harsh crush with messy, disorganised people but swallow it with bitter nervousness and decide not to fight against it. I can't help but thinking of my room mate in university, who must have experienced the same, poor soul. Go on rustling some pages as they flip.

Now that the president of the USA is already part of the action I decide to give next few pages my full attention, expecting love to blossom any moment. And soon I found myself in the opposite situation of the sweet non-planning idyll: I have planned everything and someone intervenes as if to emphasize the shocking lability of the sense of control.

"Ungu-ga-bi-da?" says the young gentleman who had crawled in front of me, while poking the book cover with his little finger. "Hey, you" - I am being polite, while closing the book attentively, including putting my finger in between the pages that I am reading, which is arguably necessary. "Ungu?" he asks again with deliberate poke and adorable seriousness in his large blue eyes. "Do you know her?" - I try to keep up a conversation but instead of his lovely voice, I hear another woman in reply. "Let me show you the farm animals, honey". He hesitates for a while, in which the mother, loaded like a camel with picture books, perceives the whole situation. "I think you will find it funnier than Michelle Obama" - she adds with a chuckle. Back within the book after the pleasant encounter and no less chuckling, the first thing I read afterwards is something like "Barack was more intelligent than most women could handle" and this seals into my mind as I think that young gentleman, that is now trying to convince his mother that he has a better idea what to do with all the books she picked for him, is too. Smiling happily, I get to the point-of-no-return in my book or in this case the point-of-return to the shelf.

And I enjoy the rest of my tea in the well known realm of Nature and Love, as I have always recognised it, together with 'Ronja, the Robber's Daugther'.