The Librbary is one of the fondest memories of my childhood. The pile of books that landed themselves at the checkout desk was much too big for a child my age--and the weight to bring them home. Children's books and later cookbooks, craftbooks and others. Sometimes it was for Mom too. She was a busy soul, cooking, cleaning and maintaining a well run hoousehold for 11 children before we moved and she had the twelth. She didn't drive so we had to walk--but the two long blocks that took us to this place were longest when we returned home with the weight of our new adventures in reading. Our return trip found few unread books or at the very least "reviewed". The children's section was a bright room adorned with large windows that let in the sun. When we got older some of us thought being newly rendered teens that we could evolve to the adult books and the "reading room"--the room where grown-ups sat reading periodicals and newspapers. I seem to remember this room with soft chairs and end tables with soft lighting. Although I am sure that we were very respectful of the silence in this "adult" space we couldn't have been nearly as respectful as the "real adults". Occasionally one would look up at you as if to say--"if you are going to be in here you need to be quiet". The initial trip to this room will always be the most exciting but the thrill soon wore off when you found that "adult" books were boring and didn't have too many pictures. It would be years before the true need for solitude would remind one of this special room with soft lighting and the need to be bathed in this kind of silence. The newer library was built where the Platner's house once stood--we both had large families and we went to the same church. Seeing a library there was strange at first--now as I enter it I am reminded that reading never failed to entertain and educate us--the library will always be one of the places in Whitewater that I loved best.

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