Today’s page 181 comes from eaarth (sic), Making a Life on a Tough New Planet, by Bill McKibben. A paragraph discusses the wrath of Mitch, a monster hurricane that pummeled Honduras and Nicaragua in 1998, killing more people than any storm since 1780 and effectively rendering road maps of the day obsolete. As page 181 coasts in to page 182 the author begins to make the point that farmers who used “sustainable” practices suffered far less long term damage than their colleagues from the traditional farming realm. There are footnotes but they lie outside the 181, from whence I dare not travel.
The author makes what I take to be a somewhat cynical comment in the form of a toss-off in this paragraph. He asserts that since Mitch did not strike the U.S. it “quickly faded from our memories”. That may be true, assuming he is writing for a non-Central American audience. But why even say that? It introduces the subject with a bit of a chip on the shoulder, preemptively shooing away any emotional memories we might have associated with that storm and replacing that with assumed ignorance. I remember Mitch, not that I possess any relevance in this equation.
I do not know why the book is called eaarth but I guess that knowledge would be a reward for actually reading the whole thing, or at least the preface. The book’s sleeve notes promise that this one book will alert readers to what need be done to “make our civilization endure.” Golly.
A truly beautiful woman is sitting nearby, at one of the computers. She is looking at pictures of something but I can’t tell from here what that something is.
I mentioned to an ex that I’ve been sitting at the libraries. She made a comment that had never occurred to me. She said that I could meet “really smart people” at the library. I never even thought of that but that is the sort of propaganda put forth by library worshipers, that we all come here united in our thirst for knowledge.
I come here because I cannot stand the sound of my own life. I come in search of random page 181s. I come to see and be seen, to let the casual notice of strangers evolve into relevance and notice that I am alive, and looking good.
I notice that library employees seem to cruise the premises as if surveying their glory years. There is a sense of pride that they seem to exude, that they are doing the good work for our society.
I think this girl I’m seeing now is looking for images of people wearing helmets. As with the cashier at the supermarket I cannot tell (from here at least) how old she is. Possibly underage, so I move on.
Looking around I see that the north end of the library is called the “MEDIA CENTER”. I think that was the name of the place at the University of South Florida (USF) where my mother and sister and I basically set up camp, plundering the place of countless records and VHS tapes for home and in-library consumption. The librarian there, a long-haired dude who was probably a student at USF, could barely restrain from rolling his eyes whenever we all appeared there, showing up almost daily as we did. That was where I discovered the 2-LP soundtrack to “Woodstock”, which somehow impressed me as being an utterly epochal moment in music. Mother seemed proud that her attendance at USF granted all of us access to the libraries there. She was studying Gerontology, a course which brought her into union with cheerily titled books like Death and Dying and fantastically-detailed explanations for statistics that say nothing more than that we are more likely to die the older we get. This coursework was her path to becoming a social worker, the first meaningful job she had after our father dumped us. Before that she had worked at the office of an insurance adjuster, a man she described as scum. I cannot remember his name, will not try and remember it, but I think she got that and a handful of other jobs through a temporary employment agency named Victor. She always described returning to work as one of the great indignities of her life, though she was proud of her years at DCF (Department of Children and Families).
I don’t remember now if we were allowed to take materials from the USF Media Center home. If not that would explain the hours and hours we spent there.
I like the way this girl types. Her hands are almost flat. Isn’t that how Glenn Gould played? I don’t think I can type flat-handed like that, but here I am trying.
I remember a comment a friend made about this library, after I told him I’d been frequenting it. He said this was his favorite library because there was never any competition for the books. He said it was a knowingly snide grin, implying this was a ghetto library. I do not agree with that but hey, he can have his thoughts. This would be the Queensbridge and Ravenswood library, situated between the nation’s largest housing project (QB) and what must be among the top 10.
I woke up from a dream last night (and a few nights previous, and in years past) in which I discovered that I had dozens of nipples. In the dream I remarked to myself that the women I’d been with had all been quite courteous in not mentioning or commenting on my extra-nipply body.
Oh jeez, a librarian I have never noticed here until now is super cute. But she has a rock, so I move on.
And I move out. I need to chase some sunlight before it is too late.
