Books

Books

2:32am Saturday, Mar 17, 2007
I remember our bookcase being twelve feet tall, and filled to the brim. Reaching the highest shelves demanded a deft touch and a bit of agility: I would climb on top of the rocking horse, anchor my right foot on the lower shelf, and hold myself up with one hand on the the ledge. Scanning the top shelf for my book of choice, I'd use my free hand to it, then push myself off from the blue frames of our wall-mounted shelves, aiming for clear ground as I jumped over the many Transformers and Legos that sat at the feet of our venerable shelves.

The light in the room had a short in it; 9 times out of 10, turning it on would blow the circuit breaker, so my sister and I learned to make do with the old incandescent lamp on our desk, aiming its bright beams towards the shelves. We learned how to angle ourselves so that our shadows wouldn't keep us from reading off book titles, and, for the times when we needed to get more than one book, we learned how to throw them so that they would land flat on the ground and out of our landing zone, so that we wouldn't have to fumble with a stack of them while making our descent.

What many treasures we found there! Dr. Seuss was well-represented, as were the Snoopy Books of Questions and Answers, Nancy Drew, Hardy Boys, Encyclopedia Brown, many, many collections of Peanuts strips, Beverly Cleary, Judy Blume, Archie comics, and a small assortment of Highlights magazines. When we were feeling super-adventurous, we'd go one level higher, making valiant attempts to open the top cupboard and see what other great books it might contain.

One day, I found "My Book About Me," and flipped through pages that my oldest sister had filled out four years earlier. By then, she was away at boarding school, so the collection of likes and dislikes, of handprints and important dates, of squiggly penmanship and christmas wantlists, these became my memory of her.

Getting books became easier over the years. I still had to be an agile climber, but by then, balancing myself on small anchors and hanging off of ledges had become second nature. Even though I would sometimes slip when I couldn't get a firm enough grip on the shelves, I became so comfortable with the process of falling that I knew exactly how to push off just enough so that I'd land clear of jagged toys and messy boxes, safely planting both my feet in the clear. I could then resume my climb and get right back up there where all the treasures lay.

Last Saturday, I was at the Palo Alto Library's book sale. I picked up a paperback copy of Charlotte's Web for 50 cents. The cover illustration was the same, but the book was smaller than the copy we used to have. It's also painted a peculiar shade of green, and feels a little bit too narrow when opened up for a good, long read.

No matter. For fifty cents, I get to remember the days when getting a book from the shelves was not a task, but an adventure.