Happy Birthday, guy. This day always sneaks up on me. Been singing along to your songs all night. My neighbors may not have appreciated it, but I needed it.

You will always be a positive force in my life.

I guess I’ve been going to the Pequot Library book sale for about 15/16 years now. I look forward to it every summer. Rooms and tents and table upon table of books to look through. Not as easy as going to a bookstore to get the book you’re looking for, but a lot more fun and a lot cheaper. Always seems to land on the hottest weekend of the year, some how, although it’s never on the same date. The air in the library hall is stifling. There are a couple of fans just blowing the hot air around. At times it’s so crowded you can barely move through the tiny aisles without brushing against someone, but you want to look at every single book and people are so into their browsing that most of the time they don’t even realize anything else is going on around them. The tents outside aren’t any better. Occasionally there’s a breeze that comes through, but really the air seems just as stifling as inside.

It’s a good opportunity to people watch. I’m told that people come from all around the country to look at rare and not-so-rare finds. I think that really it’s just people from within the state and neighboring states as well, people on cell phones from NYC telling their friends that they’re “up in Connecticut” for the day at a book fair and they’ll be back in the city later that tonight. How quaint. It’s interesting to see what books people gravitate for. Always conversations about what people have read and what they haven’t and what they want to read. People recommending books to others. Some people come empty-handed. Others bring boxes and bags and wagons to put books into. Some people leave with one book, others leave with 50. It’s insane.

Some years are better than others. I can remember one year that I didn’t purchase a single book, but I remember another year filling up an entire paper bag with books. I don’t think I’ve ever paid more than $25 at a time for books each year, and leave with a significant amount. I think of all the money I save compared to the list price of the books I purchase. I think of all the money the library makes from this sale to keep it’s doors open to the public. I think of the uniqueness of the library — how it looks less like a public building and more like a private home.

Pequot Library It’s on this weekend. I will be there, hopefully Saturday after I end my shift of volunteering at another library. ha.

Been out of commission for the last week or so. Funny how the body works — one day your healthy and feeling fine, going about your business and the next, your body is in pain, trying to tell you something isn’t quite right. I like to consider myself in tune with my body. I know there are familiar pains, like when I’ve been walking all day and I get home and it hurts to walk up the few stairs to my apartment. I know I can’t eat certain things without getting a stomach ache, and I know how my stomach is going to feel if I go ahead and do that. There are other familiar pains I have, when something isn’t right.

I knew the pain I had been getting over the last couple of days from the time I had a kidney infection, years before. The pain this time was a little more intense and so finally I had to have it checked out. Yes, I did have a kidney infection. Yes, I would have to get some rest and take antibiotics. Yes, I would have to go without tea and coffee and caffeine in exchange for water and cranberry juice. As far as I knew, the antibiotics I was given were doing their job, but it turns out they weren’t. I was put on a stronger dose of antibiotics and so far, I think they’re doing the trick. The pain isn’t as intense, doesn’t last as long. I don’t feel as tense or anxious. My body isn’t in a panic of pain.

I joked about it with a co-worker, saying it’s just a kidney, I have another one, but really that was just my way of dealing with my anxiety. Really, I added, I’d like to have them both. I was scared that if I didn’t take care of myself while I was sick that something more than an infection could happen, and so when I am sick I am a baby, to myself, mostly.

Britt took care of me, taking me to the hospital, and bringing me home after the second visit to the doctor, running to the pharmacy twice, and keeping me company, which really was the best medicine because if it’s just me alone, the panic is more harsh. It’s good to have focus on something/someone else. I’d like to thank online games (pogo!) and marathons of The State and Reno 911 that were, luckily enough, running the week I’ve been ill. Reno 911 never ceases to amuse me and I have a soft spot in my heart for The State.

Another great distraction was the release of the new Harry Potter movie which was entertaining and disappointing at the same time. I might write a long rant about that, since I want to get in the habit of writing more and updating my blog more, but right now I have written enough. Would like to get back to reading. Right now, I’m reading The Night Watch by Sarah Waters, which is slow moving, but enjoyable. I also have an itch for new music to listen to, so there’s another distraction.

naked visionary

delight in whiskey
and hopeless drunken rantings
bed growing radiant in the sweet electricity of midnight
a giggle madhouse
a clatter of high dreams
in a city of scholars and universities and cemeteries
and hospitals and sirens and bleak war machinery
and lonesome concrete tragedies

my apartment eyes the street
while we’re undressing
and i’m hallucinating stanzas
of tender and crazy poetry
hanging from the streetlight

The Ferguson library was my favorite place to go when I was little. I can’t figure out what made it so welcome to me. I think, mostly, it was the abundance of books. I’ve visited different libraries but none seemed so inviting… from the open floor plan to the sectioned children’s library to the rug in the front hallway that I swear twisted my feet as I walked on it. The amount of books I borrowed was remarkable. Their audio/video selection was impressive. I love libraries a great deal, and I can always find something I like about them, but this one was special. I make it a point to visit now and then, to shop at the used bookshop and just to make sure it’s still standing.

It’s under renovation nowadays and nothing looks the same as it did 20+ years ago, but I’m looking forward to seeing the changes. I have even signed up to volunteer at the bookstore there on weekends, so that I can give back a little to the community that was able to nurture my reading. Proceeds from this bookstore go towards funding the library and other literacy programs. I am a strong believer in the difference reading can make in one’s life… and I believe that the right resources should be available to everyone. I think a lot of people take their ability to read for granted. I’ve been lucky that literacy programs have been available in my area and that I had programs like Reading is Fundamental growing up that would hand out books to the children of the city of Stamford. I’ve been lucky to have parents that included reading in my daily life. Not everyone is so privileged.

I’ve gone for one training session, and I already know that it is something I am going to enjoy doing. Making sure people get books.