WEBVTT 1 00:00:05.200 --> 00:00:08.119 Hello, I'm welcomed stories all the time. The glad you 2 00:00:08.160 --> 00:00:11.359 are here. Let's get into it. A shaft of morning 3 00:00:11.439 --> 00:00:14.519 light slanted through the tall, wavy glassed windows, painting buttery 4 00:00:14.560 --> 00:00:18.160 rectangles across the reading tables. I arrived processly at nine, 5 00:00:18.239 --> 00:00:20.640 as I become my habit in retirement, but tucked under 6 00:00:20.640 --> 00:00:23.480 my alm and coffee in hand, our library has always 7 00:00:23.480 --> 00:00:25.920 settled me. The slow, steady hash, the faint smell of 8 00:00:25.960 --> 00:00:28.199 wood polish and aging paper, and the comforting weight of 9 00:00:28.239 --> 00:00:31.760 so many collected words. I've spent years wandering these stacks, 10 00:00:31.760 --> 00:00:33.799 first as a grade school of tracing my finger along 11 00:00:33.840 --> 00:00:37.039 the spines, later as a language arts teacher, checking references 12 00:00:37.039 --> 00:00:39.880 for lessons, and now finally as a daily patron with 13 00:00:39.920 --> 00:00:43.000 long stretches of un hurried time. That morning I made 14 00:00:43.000 --> 00:00:45.560 for the British History Shelves section nine hundred forty when, 15 00:00:45.560 --> 00:00:47.840 according to the DW system to which both memory and 16 00:00:47.880 --> 00:00:50.359 muscle had oriented me since Missess Cavanaugh gave me a 17 00:00:50.359 --> 00:00:53.320 shelving job during high school, I had borrowed a slim 18 00:00:53.320 --> 00:00:57.000 paperback on Cromwell Last Week Social Form in seventeenth century England, 19 00:00:57.079 --> 00:00:59.079 and today I slaid it gently into its home spot 20 00:00:59.119 --> 00:01:01.719 between the Civil War diaries and how the tudors ate 21 00:01:02.240 --> 00:01:05.200 I always check call number, spine, shelf and the little 22 00:01:05.239 --> 00:01:08.719 colored sticker denoting historical nonfiiction. This ritual used to be 23 00:01:08.760 --> 00:01:11.680 so conscious. Now, with more time to nose its life 24 00:01:11.760 --> 00:01:15.239 small graces, I find myself slow walking each step to day. 25 00:01:15.359 --> 00:01:18.519 Something made me linger. The spine label was correct cell 26 00:01:18.719 --> 00:01:21.480 for the author, but the JWY number I'd always remembered 27 00:01:21.560 --> 00:01:24.400 nine hundred forty one point twenty one. That was the 28 00:01:24.400 --> 00:01:27.560 tidy arrangement since at least the late eighties. Yet now 29 00:01:27.599 --> 00:01:30.319 the spinewed nine hundred forty two point four slashus al 30 00:01:30.400 --> 00:01:33.680 in crisp fresh type, and the sticker underneath blue not yellow, 31 00:01:33.719 --> 00:01:35.959 carried a thin faded red stripe. I couldn't recall ever 32 00:01:36.000 --> 00:01:38.519 seeing on this section. I set my coffee down and 33 00:01:38.599 --> 00:01:41.840 checked the shelf. On both sides. The Civil War diaries 34 00:01:41.840 --> 00:01:44.000 bore a new number two, a shift from nine hundred 35 00:01:44.079 --> 00:01:46.560 forty one point two slash key and two nine hundred 36 00:01:46.640 --> 00:01:49.120 forty one point two hundred forty two slash k yen. 37 00:01:49.680 --> 00:01:53.200 Another familiar brook Marine changes around red point once slotted 38 00:01:53.239 --> 00:01:55.719 at five hundred seventy four point five hundred thirty two 39 00:01:55.920 --> 00:01:59.000 was now five hundred seventy seven point fourteen. Even the 40 00:01:59.040 --> 00:02:01.519 pattern on its sticker change a blue and green dot 41 00:02:01.519 --> 00:02:06.000 in the lower corner. A mistake new cataloging. But I 42 00:02:06.040 --> 00:02:09.439 couldn't remember seeing any big staff pushes or notifications, and 43 00:02:09.520 --> 00:02:12.520 our library prided itself on traditions. Every small re catalog 44 00:02:12.599 --> 00:02:15.360 set off weeks of careful transition. Was this some late 45 00:02:15.439 --> 00:02:18.000 night project by a stell our energetic part time clerk. 46 00:02:18.639 --> 00:02:21.719 I made a mental note, then, handing the matter the 47 00:02:21.759 --> 00:02:24.360 light touch of curiosity, it seemed I reached into my 48 00:02:24.400 --> 00:02:27.599 batted brand journal, my library lock, half diary, half scavenger 49 00:02:27.639 --> 00:02:30.120 hunt had scribbled a line Cromwell book call number NA 50 00:02:30.199 --> 00:02:32.479 nine hundred forty two point four new stick of code 51 00:02:32.560 --> 00:02:35.280 check After lunch. The day pressed on with easy rhythms 52 00:02:35.280 --> 00:02:37.199 and old friend's letter to answer a walk to the 53 00:02:37.240 --> 00:02:40.280 bakery errands. But the image of those numbers and near 54 00:02:40.400 --> 00:02:42.719 unfamiliar sticker codes lingered like a puzzle piece that were 55 00:02:42.800 --> 00:02:45.719 quite fit. In all my decades of shelving and borrowing, 56 00:02:45.800 --> 00:02:48.400 I'd never seen a reclassification so subtle, almost as if 57 00:02:48.400 --> 00:02:50.400 the world's order had shifted half a degree. While I 58 00:02:50.520 --> 00:02:53.400 wasn't looking. I took it as a gift, not an intrusion, 59 00:02:53.439 --> 00:02:56.000 but a quiet invitation. It was a good morning for 60 00:02:56.039 --> 00:03:00.400 invitations asturisk. By noon the following day, the Lifeburry was 61 00:03:00.439 --> 00:03:03.759 in full drousy bustle. It isn't large, just a few rooms, 62 00:03:03.759 --> 00:03:05.719 a wood flow of reading hall and a back office, 63 00:03:05.719 --> 00:03:08.879 but it holds its own in our coastal town. Half Victorian, 64 00:03:08.960 --> 00:03:12.080 half makedew modern, with carved banisters and book displays touting 65 00:03:12.080 --> 00:03:14.879 poetry slams on Thursday evenings. It draws every one, from 66 00:03:14.879 --> 00:03:18.680 school children to elderly mariners. Missesqua Havanogg posides from behind 67 00:03:18.680 --> 00:03:21.120 the main desk, her sharp eyes in softer voice, enforcing 68 00:03:21.120 --> 00:03:24.159 a kind of benevolent orador. She's caught more hours here 69 00:03:24.159 --> 00:03:26.360 than any living person. She knows which novels have been 70 00:03:26.439 --> 00:03:29.000 checked out twelve times, and which local genealogist likes to 71 00:03:29.039 --> 00:03:32.439 rearrange the true crime display. A steale zips around in sneakers, 72 00:03:32.520 --> 00:03:35.840 sorting new donations, her pony tail bobbing, and there's always 73 00:03:35.840 --> 00:03:39.080 a ractic of regulars. Mister de Witt, mild mannered and precise, 74 00:03:39.319 --> 00:03:41.639 who keeps a twice folded map of British regiments in 75 00:03:41.680 --> 00:03:44.759 his breast pocket. Retired Captain Farnsworth, a tall man with 76 00:03:44.879 --> 00:03:47.240 arms like ropes, who write senseless notes in the margins 77 00:03:47.280 --> 00:03:50.240 of adventure novels. The Angel twins who giggle through reading 78 00:03:50.280 --> 00:03:53.560 out whenever a story mentions sea monsters. At least once 79 00:03:53.639 --> 00:03:55.960 or twice a week, some out of town visitor appears, 80 00:03:56.039 --> 00:03:58.599 hunting for a marriage record and a cure family legend, 81 00:03:58.719 --> 00:04:01.639 or a photograph of the Red Point Lighthouse. I'm known 82 00:04:01.680 --> 00:04:03.960 here two not quite staff, but not merely a patron. 83 00:04:04.479 --> 00:04:07.800 My former students sometimes return in summer, leaving anonymousticky notes 84 00:04:07.800 --> 00:04:10.680 in the poetry section. Hi, mister al picked up Alden 85 00:04:10.840 --> 00:04:13.439 like he said. I've written years worth of postcards from 86 00:04:13.439 --> 00:04:16.120 these tables, posted to old colleagues, from schools, a tourt 87 00:04:16.120 --> 00:04:19.959 in three states. The little routines, the quite rituals, shuffling books, 88 00:04:20.040 --> 00:04:23.079 marking my place in my lark, memorizing changes in the stacks, 89 00:04:23.079 --> 00:04:26.560 fill my days. The local history Alchover's Park Museum with 90 00:04:26.639 --> 00:04:29.240 glass case's displaying she appracked art facts and weathered photos 91 00:04:29.279 --> 00:04:32.480 of the wharf. Though small is a center of communal gravity, 92 00:04:33.040 --> 00:04:36.120 neighbors have built memories here of every detail is fiercely remembered, 93 00:04:36.199 --> 00:04:38.160 especially by the likes of mister de Witt, who will 94 00:04:38.240 --> 00:04:40.439 cheerfully recount which marine atlis used to sit on which 95 00:04:40.480 --> 00:04:43.040 shelf in nineteen eighty six, and who move it? I 96 00:04:43.120 --> 00:04:45.720 lingered after lunch, trace in my finger once more along 97 00:04:45.759 --> 00:04:48.519 the spines in the nine hundred forty ones, Please sticked now, 98 00:04:49.199 --> 00:04:51.480 I half hummed an ancient foot too, in half conjured 99 00:04:51.519 --> 00:04:55.079 my teaching days. Miss Ess Kavanaugh appeared beside me, sitting 100 00:04:55.120 --> 00:04:58.800 down the stack of interlibrary loans back to the British neil. 101 00:04:58.879 --> 00:05:02.040 She asked, with the wink. One day you'll exhaust them, 102 00:05:02.319 --> 00:05:05.600 I smiled, Not at this rate, this seems question for you. 103 00:05:05.759 --> 00:05:10.160 Have we read on the call numbers lately? Her brow furrowed. No, 104 00:05:10.160 --> 00:05:13.120 No major system since the computer conversion years ago, just 105 00:05:13.120 --> 00:05:17.800 the usual relabels here and there. Notice the stickers, I pointed, 106 00:05:18.480 --> 00:05:21.240 some new colors in the nine hundreds. She took a 107 00:05:21.240 --> 00:05:23.079 book from the shelf, peered at it through her half 108 00:05:23.120 --> 00:05:26.399 moon glasses, and shirked, odd, might be a misprint from 109 00:05:26.399 --> 00:05:29.120 the sticker sheets. I'll run it by stell. She lowered 110 00:05:29.120 --> 00:05:32.600 her voice to a conspiratorial whisper. The longer you stay here, 111 00:05:32.759 --> 00:05:35.920 my dear, the more you'll see things arranged themselves. I 112 00:05:36.000 --> 00:05:39.240 laughed at that, her tone dry familiar. But after she left, 113 00:05:39.240 --> 00:05:41.519 I fished up my lug again, handwriting, now a bit 114 00:05:41.560 --> 00:05:45.160 more intent, perhaps, I wrote, the library has developed a 115 00:05:45.199 --> 00:05:49.000 mind of its own. As a teacher, had always encouraged questioning, noticing, 116 00:05:49.480 --> 00:05:53.199 cross checking, wisdom. Start small. On my way out, Old 117 00:05:53.199 --> 00:05:55.399 Captain fonzw With nodded to me from the periodicals, his 118 00:05:55.439 --> 00:05:58.000 hands tracing the faded chot of a whaling row. He 119 00:05:58.079 --> 00:06:00.759 nodded at the shells, grinning. I once borrowed a book 120 00:06:00.800 --> 00:06:02.959 from there that was mostly sea myths, but found it 121 00:06:03.040 --> 00:06:06.000 later written up as historical record. Libraries are as changeable 122 00:06:06.000 --> 00:06:10.079 as tides lie, he declared. You'll see. I accepted these 123 00:06:10.160 --> 00:06:14.839 easy oddities most days. That was enough asterisk. On the 124 00:06:14.879 --> 00:06:17.759 third morning, I found myself drawn, perhaps stubbornly, to test 125 00:06:17.800 --> 00:06:20.560 my own memory. There was a particular old hog cover, 126 00:06:20.600 --> 00:06:23.040 a collection of local legends called Legends of Red Point 127 00:06:23.120 --> 00:06:25.360 that had sat to my recollection on the bottom shelf 128 00:06:25.399 --> 00:06:27.959 of the local focal section. Since I was eleven, I 129 00:06:28.040 --> 00:06:31.079 wanted to confirm it. The book itself was nothing fancy, 130 00:06:31.279 --> 00:06:32.839 but as a child, I'd read its Tale of the 131 00:06:32.879 --> 00:06:35.519 Red Point like Keeper's Ghost in a purple sleep under torchlight. 132 00:06:35.839 --> 00:06:38.639 Convinced the stories slid into the town with the afternoon tide. 133 00:06:39.079 --> 00:06:41.959 I reached the shelf and stopped. The space was occupied 134 00:06:41.959 --> 00:06:45.120 now by Red Point Foukrps, a community reader, slim and glossy, 135 00:06:45.240 --> 00:06:48.399 not the rough, dark green cover. I remembered the titles 136 00:06:48.399 --> 00:06:51.199 to eat aside assaltwa to songs and lighthouses of turners 137 00:06:51.199 --> 00:06:53.720 in it poor reordered to the former, moved he shell's left, 138 00:06:53.720 --> 00:06:56.959 displaying a ge number shifted by four digits. It all 139 00:06:56.959 --> 00:07:00.560 seemed subtly unmore. I opened the cattalog computer and typed 140 00:07:00.560 --> 00:07:04.199 the Legends of Red Point. No results. I searched by 141 00:07:04.199 --> 00:07:08.000 author Harriet Sally's, whose by line still echoed in my memory. Nothing. 142 00:07:08.759 --> 00:07:11.240 Even the usual fall buck of printed card catalogs saved 143 00:07:11.240 --> 00:07:13.920 as a compromise to modernity, held no trace of the title. 144 00:07:14.480 --> 00:07:17.000 I caught Missus kavanoggh as she returned from a parent's 145 00:07:17.040 --> 00:07:20.959 group meeting holding a box of tattered magazines Harriet Sally's 146 00:07:20.959 --> 00:07:23.079 book on Sea Legends. Did it get checked out or moved? 147 00:07:23.759 --> 00:07:28.240 Missus Kavanaugh pursed her lips, thoughtful, I've never catalog to Salli's. 148 00:07:28.319 --> 00:07:30.279 Might you be thinking of Red Point Folklore? That's the 149 00:07:30.319 --> 00:07:33.319 collectionist still orders a knew every few years. The book 150 00:07:33.360 --> 00:07:35.240 I mean was older, green cover used to be in 151 00:07:35.240 --> 00:07:38.199 the lower left corner by the fire exit. She shook 152 00:07:38.240 --> 00:07:41.079 her head. I've worked here forty years, dear, I think 153 00:07:41.120 --> 00:07:43.199 he may be mixing it up. No, Salli's here and 154 00:07:43.279 --> 00:07:46.560 up before ninety five, at least. I bit back my protests, 155 00:07:46.600 --> 00:07:51.319 unwilling to press. Maybe it really was confusion, yet doubt aroused. 156 00:07:51.360 --> 00:07:53.600 I returned home that evening and leave through my library 157 00:07:53.600 --> 00:07:56.399 log book siers of dojio pages, check out dates, quarts, 158 00:07:56.439 --> 00:07:59.680 coffee down for class, and little clip reviews. In an 159 00:07:59.800 --> 00:08:02.279 entry from March two thousand four, I found it Legends 160 00:08:02.319 --> 00:08:05.120 of Red Point by Harriet Sally's Dewey three hundred ninety 161 00:08:05.120 --> 00:08:07.879 eight point two hundred nine, great account of spillwater Sunday quote. 162 00:08:08.120 --> 00:08:10.319 No one alive remembers the bellst whole, but I'll hear 163 00:08:10.439 --> 00:08:12.480 after dark. There on the facing page had pasted a 164 00:08:12.480 --> 00:08:14.279 fold copy check at card with my own name and 165 00:08:14.319 --> 00:08:17.439 the date. A second stamped entry two months later listed 166 00:08:17.480 --> 00:08:20.040 the Sally's title beneath it, the scrolled numbers three hundred 167 00:08:20.120 --> 00:08:23.800 ninety eight point two hundred nine slash assail my own handwriting, 168 00:08:23.839 --> 00:08:27.560 my own checkout's dam And Yet now both catalog and 169 00:08:27.600 --> 00:08:30.600 librarian was certain no such book had ever occupied a shelf. Here, 170 00:08:31.160 --> 00:08:34.519 the contradiction hovered between trivial and quietly magnificent. Back at 171 00:08:34.519 --> 00:08:36.759 the library, just to be sure, I checked a battered 172 00:08:36.759 --> 00:08:39.000 copy of Saltwater Song's The next nearest title from that 173 00:08:39.159 --> 00:08:42.039 chef Wedged into its back cover was an old yellow 174 00:08:42.080 --> 00:08:45.200 checkout slipped from two thousand eight in faint purple ink. 175 00:08:45.320 --> 00:08:47.360 Under the column for a date returned, the words of 176 00:08:47.399 --> 00:08:50.720 Sally's Sea Tales appeared sandwiched between two other titles, a 177 00:08:50.720 --> 00:08:53.200 phantom ghost book hiding in the traces of a real 178 00:08:53.200 --> 00:08:56.279 and official record. Suddenly, what had seemed to harm this 179 00:08:56.360 --> 00:08:58.559 oddity began to feel like a question that might rearrange 180 00:08:58.600 --> 00:09:02.159 the entire room asterisk. I caught mister de wit by 181 00:09:02.200 --> 00:09:04.960 the reverend Shelves, whose brow furroud as he compared two atlases. 182 00:09:05.480 --> 00:09:07.720 He listened to my story about legends of Red Point, 183 00:09:07.799 --> 00:09:11.279 then brightened, Oh, certainly I recall a version, though in 184 00:09:11.279 --> 00:09:13.360 a copy I read as a lad The illustrations all 185 00:09:13.399 --> 00:09:16.000 had women in red shawls, not the blue uniforms everyone 186 00:09:16.080 --> 00:09:18.320 draws now. And the first story was about a black dog, 187 00:09:18.480 --> 00:09:21.279 not the light keepers goes. He gave a little laugh. 188 00:09:22.039 --> 00:09:24.360 Estel will insist on a different edition. Her mother recited 189 00:09:24.360 --> 00:09:26.240 her the Fisherman's tale. The book is like one of 190 00:09:26.240 --> 00:09:28.440 those houses the changes when you're away for the holidays. 191 00:09:29.120 --> 00:09:31.080 Later A checked in at the front desk, as Estelle 192 00:09:31.159 --> 00:09:33.879 scan your arrivals. She wore him this smatch pair of 193 00:09:33.919 --> 00:09:36.759 Christmas socks, and as always tapped along with some absent 194 00:09:36.919 --> 00:09:40.279 internal beat. Estelle, do you have that Sally See Legends 195 00:09:40.279 --> 00:09:43.120 book in your records? She shook her head, scrolling through 196 00:09:43.120 --> 00:09:46.519 the digital catalog with practice speed. No, Sally's we do 197 00:09:46.639 --> 00:09:49.519 Red Point Folk Corps edited by Mary Sweetman, several editions, 198 00:09:49.519 --> 00:09:51.600 big blue wave on the cover. I remember helping my 199 00:09:51.679 --> 00:09:53.399 mom replace it when the old copy walked to the 200 00:09:53.399 --> 00:09:55.919 pipe burst. No green cover Sali's ever, as far as 201 00:09:55.960 --> 00:09:59.679 I know, strange, I said, because I checked it out myself. 202 00:09:59.759 --> 00:10:02.279 Mark two thousand four wrote about it for the Elementary 203 00:10:02.320 --> 00:10:05.080 Legends Night. Could you be mixing up authors? I know 204 00:10:05.120 --> 00:10:08.080 the Sweetmen copyright has the black dog story, but she 205 00:10:08.159 --> 00:10:11.679 trailed off. I skeptical, but not unfriendly. This wider net 206 00:10:11.679 --> 00:10:14.639 of memory left me with more questions than anzos. I 207 00:10:14.720 --> 00:10:16.799 began to feel as if feach person who entered the 208 00:10:16.799 --> 00:10:20.000 library lived inside their own annotated edition. I turned to 209 00:10:20.039 --> 00:10:23.399 the archives, the microphone corner, where old newspapers, staff locks 210 00:10:23.600 --> 00:10:27.159 and donated anniversary pamphlets were stored. Rooting through the spring 211 00:10:27.240 --> 00:10:30.080 nineteen seventy nine local directorate, I found a yellow print 212 00:10:30.080 --> 00:10:33.519 out of circulation ledgers. There in fine gray print were 213 00:10:33.519 --> 00:10:36.080 two entries on a folklore red point focalo slash and 214 00:10:36.080 --> 00:10:38.919 Sweetman slash three hundred ninety eight point two hundred nine 215 00:10:38.960 --> 00:10:41.919 slash s w slush replaced nineteen eighty one and Father 216 00:10:42.039 --> 00:10:44.960 Dam Legends of red Point slash h Sally slash three 217 00:10:45.039 --> 00:10:47.679 hundred ninety eight point two hundred nine slash sal slash 218 00:10:47.720 --> 00:10:51.919 mark lost. Marginality ruled the record. One book survived, another 219 00:10:51.960 --> 00:10:55.120 Bailey noted, and then gone. The basement storage rooms held 220 00:10:55.159 --> 00:10:58.279 their own eccentricities, as always. Two metal island cabinets full 221 00:10:58.279 --> 00:11:00.480 of clippings, a row of musty hard god was pressed 222 00:11:00.480 --> 00:11:03.320 against the concrete wall, flipping through a shelf labeled a 223 00:11:03.360 --> 00:11:05.519 red punt Lending with draw on. I discovered a sheaf 224 00:11:05.559 --> 00:11:09.000 of loose, yellowing papers half a story on the Lost 225 00:11:09.000 --> 00:11:12.120 Bells of Knob's Hollow. The paper was stamped Redpunt Lending 226 00:11:12.159 --> 00:11:14.799 with drawn it with an unfamiliar logo, a stylized heron 227 00:11:14.960 --> 00:11:18.440 not seen anywhere else in the library. As the hours passed, 228 00:11:18.600 --> 00:11:22.000 a fog of variation settled in. I started to hear faintly, 229 00:11:22.200 --> 00:11:24.480 not simple gaps or confusions, but a shape of shifting, 230 00:11:24.639 --> 00:11:27.879 live in pattern of collective history, mismatched memories, perhaps even 231 00:11:27.879 --> 00:11:31.120 physical ambiguity. On my desk at home, I began laying 232 00:11:31.120 --> 00:11:33.600 out small evidence, my own old notes, check out stubbs, 233 00:11:33.600 --> 00:11:37.120 printed catalog numbers, a cutting from a newspaper, naming h salies, 234 00:11:37.279 --> 00:11:40.000 emails from teaching colleagues, mentioning the Green Atlas, and quoting 235 00:11:40.000 --> 00:11:42.639 passages I could no longer find in my copy. It 236 00:11:42.679 --> 00:11:44.480 grew clear that this wasn't a trick of my aging 237 00:11:44.480 --> 00:11:47.120 mind or a byproduct of poor I could keeping here 238 00:11:47.360 --> 00:11:50.399 now was a persuasive, insistent pattern, a dance of shifting 239 00:11:50.399 --> 00:11:54.080 call numbers, editions, even texts. I not only did every 240 00:11:54.120 --> 00:11:57.000 person seem to experience their own private version of each book, 241 00:11:57.159 --> 00:11:59.720 but the library's official records flexed and trank round a 242 00:11:59.799 --> 00:12:03.440 tide of collective memory and conversation. One afternoon, in the 243 00:12:03.519 --> 00:12:05.559 lull between children's story Hout and the arrival of the 244 00:12:05.559 --> 00:12:08.120 Crosswick Group, a leaf through my own notes cross the years. 245 00:12:08.759 --> 00:12:12.720 There were annotations and spidery pencil stacked with contradictions. Nineteen 246 00:12:12.799 --> 00:12:15.440 ninety six marine atlas, page forty two, map with three 247 00:12:15.440 --> 00:12:18.960 bait inlets two thousand and two, same matlas, only two inlets, 248 00:12:19.000 --> 00:12:21.720 but a handwritten annotation third point see sendbos curve and 249 00:12:21.799 --> 00:12:25.559 blue two thousand nine. See also the Green Heron index. 250 00:12:26.200 --> 00:12:27.759 I had no idea what I ad meant by this. 251 00:12:28.559 --> 00:12:30.519 Each entry felt less like a record and more alike 252 00:12:30.519 --> 00:12:33.200 an uncertainty principle. The more I remembered, the less stable 253 00:12:33.200 --> 00:12:36.639 the past appeared. One afternoon, Folding myself into a chair 254 00:12:36.679 --> 00:12:39.399 by the windows, I struck up conversation with Missus Finton, 255 00:12:39.399 --> 00:12:41.799 who had come from North Carolina for a few weeks research. 256 00:12:42.600 --> 00:12:44.960 She spoke in a warm roll, telling me your recipe 257 00:12:44.960 --> 00:12:47.159 book on the town's cooking contest for a print recipes 258 00:12:47.360 --> 00:12:49.799 one hundred one years of pies, completely different than the 259 00:12:49.799 --> 00:12:51.759 one my cousin sent me from here ten years ago, 260 00:12:51.840 --> 00:12:54.639 hers a spiral bound chok full of barbecue tipped, and 261 00:12:54.679 --> 00:12:57.399 never did find the sweet potato pie I remembered. I 262 00:12:57.440 --> 00:12:59.600 saw it. Then. Not only were the library's holdings in 263 00:12:59.639 --> 00:13:02.559 apparent flux, but so two were its histories, its own records, 264 00:13:02.600 --> 00:13:06.360 infecting the outside world like some slow blooming coral. That week, 265 00:13:06.440 --> 00:13:09.080 a biography I'd borrowed long ago, Hammer of the Fog, 266 00:13:09.279 --> 00:13:11.399 The Life of Ernest Fenn, turned up in a donation 267 00:13:11.480 --> 00:13:15.000 box at the back press flat was a worn checkout 268 00:13:15.000 --> 00:13:18.000 slip with my name, dated August twenty three, nineteen eighty two, 269 00:13:18.519 --> 00:13:20.679 and on the line just below mine Legends of Red 270 00:13:20.720 --> 00:13:23.720 point three hundred ninety eight point two hundred nine slash Sail. 271 00:13:24.360 --> 00:13:26.759 The slip was attached to no book by Salies, yet 272 00:13:26.759 --> 00:13:30.639 the title and familiar fountain pending quietly persisted. I stared 273 00:13:30.639 --> 00:13:33.200 at my own signature to memory, physically preserved and yet 274 00:13:33.200 --> 00:13:36.600 disavowed by every outward trace. In that moment, I realized 275 00:13:36.639 --> 00:13:39.399 the contradiction ran deeper than simple error, and whatever was 276 00:13:39.440 --> 00:13:41.279 at what was thoroughly woven into the bones of this 277 00:13:41.360 --> 00:13:45.159 place and into the memory of everyone who came here. Asterisk. 278 00:13:45.720 --> 00:13:48.159 For days, I rambled the aisles with purpose I hadn't 279 00:13:48.159 --> 00:13:50.080 felt in years, resolved to put my mind at rest, 280 00:13:50.080 --> 00:13:53.080 if only by test or refutation, the comfort of order. 281 00:13:53.120 --> 00:13:55.320 After all, had long to find both my teaching and 282 00:13:55.360 --> 00:13:58.840 my notions of history. I had believed, without saying as much, 283 00:13:58.919 --> 00:14:00.559 that the library was as good and a model of 284 00:14:00.600 --> 00:14:02.679 memory as any town could hope for, a keeper of 285 00:14:02.720 --> 00:14:05.759 stories and a map to our collective past. The past. 286 00:14:05.840 --> 00:14:09.120 I still wanted to believe deserve stability. But what if 287 00:14:09.120 --> 00:14:12.200 that faith was misplaced? What if, instead of a bulwork 288 00:14:12.240 --> 00:14:15.120 of continuity, the shelves and their contents with themselves a fluid, 289 00:14:15.200 --> 00:14:17.440 quietly shaped change in campas the collective memory of the 290 00:14:17.480 --> 00:14:19.919 town not imposed from above, but written and were written 291 00:14:19.960 --> 00:14:23.120 by hands in stories and unregistered impulses. What if each 292 00:14:23.120 --> 00:14:27.679 book existed not only in multiple editions, but in multiple realities, shifted, renamed, misremembered, 293 00:14:27.759 --> 00:14:30.559 made new with each retelling. I needed to test this theory. 294 00:14:31.120 --> 00:14:33.320 I chose not cure volume about it. A Field Guide 295 00:14:33.320 --> 00:14:37.519 to Coastal Shells unchanged my mind since childhood, brown cloth bound, 296 00:14:37.519 --> 00:14:40.639 published in nineteen forty eight with the same water Danish dedication. 297 00:14:41.279 --> 00:14:44.200 I borrowed it, this time making exhaustive notes, page numbers, 298 00:14:44.320 --> 00:14:47.559 illustration sequences, chapter headings. Even the flourishes in the letter 299 00:14:47.639 --> 00:14:50.240 are on the title page. I mapped the index on 300 00:14:50.279 --> 00:14:53.440 a scrap of drawing paper. Satisfied that I had captured 301 00:14:53.440 --> 00:14:56.879 its essence, I returned it after a day. The following morning, 302 00:14:57.000 --> 00:14:59.159 I pulled it from the shelf and sat at the corner. Table. 303 00:15:00.039 --> 00:15:02.799 Number had shifted a minor rebel in digits, perhaps, but 304 00:15:02.879 --> 00:15:05.159 now the guide bore a five hundred seventy eight point 305 00:15:05.240 --> 00:15:08.559 seven hundred sixty five. In the index, My old list 306 00:15:08.639 --> 00:15:11.519 was scrambled. New entries appeared, including a rope in beamont 307 00:15:11.559 --> 00:15:13.480 flats and the kings Law muscle. Beds of places I 308 00:15:13.519 --> 00:15:15.320 had never seen marked on a map, but which now 309 00:15:15.360 --> 00:15:17.000 will label both in the guide and on a new 310 00:15:17.120 --> 00:15:19.879 hand colored Ford up map. At the back, even the 311 00:15:19.919 --> 00:15:23.000 illustration for Atlantic rib muscle was redrawn, showing a varian 312 00:15:23.039 --> 00:15:26.720 shell coloration across the inside back cover. A pencil denotation 313 00:15:26.840 --> 00:15:30.200 reader for Dad, so you never get lost. After staring, 314 00:15:30.279 --> 00:15:32.600 blinking and comparing the facts, I walked to the desk 315 00:15:32.639 --> 00:15:35.559 and asthmas es Kavanagh Estelle and mistered a wit for 316 00:15:35.600 --> 00:15:39.000 their recollections of the Field Guide. Each described their version 317 00:15:39.039 --> 00:15:42.200 and assass Kavanock favored it for its shell sketching section, 318 00:15:42.240 --> 00:15:45.519 which mine no longer contained. Estelle recalled a children's activity 319 00:15:45.519 --> 00:15:47.679 in a back never present in any edition. I remembered, 320 00:15:47.879 --> 00:15:50.279 misted a whitch, sighted the small chart of migratory birds 321 00:15:50.279 --> 00:15:53.480 preceding the title page. Not one version matched what I 322 00:15:53.480 --> 00:15:55.919 had borrowed, what I had so carefully documented twenty four 323 00:15:55.919 --> 00:15:59.480 hours before. Rather than threatened, I felt strange relief, amusement. 324 00:15:59.600 --> 00:16:02.879 Almost there were as many libraries as there were patrons, 325 00:16:02.919 --> 00:16:05.480 and yet somehow the same space, the same shelves, held 326 00:16:05.480 --> 00:16:08.320 them all. Increasingly, it seemed as if the library grew 327 00:16:08.360 --> 00:16:12.080 in response to recollection expectation or need my lock, but 328 00:16:12.159 --> 00:16:14.799 began to fill not with certainty, but with comparison's versions 329 00:16:14.840 --> 00:16:19.120 of versions and mismatched catalog codes, admirable contradictions. The lesson 330 00:16:19.159 --> 00:16:21.399 of my teaching years returned to me. All history is 331 00:16:21.399 --> 00:16:24.120 a partial, all stories incomplete. But here was a living 332 00:16:24.159 --> 00:16:26.679 canvas and narka that rured itself as freely and subtly 333 00:16:26.720 --> 00:16:31.120 as a tide rewriting the shore. Asterisk conversation spun outward 334 00:16:31.840 --> 00:16:34.679 the regulars grew interested in the puzzle through disagreements. Always 335 00:16:34.720 --> 00:16:37.440 gentle mister DeWitt joked about checking the spine of his 336 00:16:37.519 --> 00:16:39.759 World War Roam and Two compendium every visit to see 337 00:16:39.759 --> 00:16:41.759 if to day's Battle of Arnham had made the indicts. 338 00:16:42.600 --> 00:16:45.480 Estelle always up for riddle, proposed trying to stabilize a 339 00:16:45.519 --> 00:16:47.399 book by reading it allowed to three or more people 340 00:16:47.440 --> 00:16:50.960 at once, an experiment for the following weekend. Missus karaknox 341 00:16:50.960 --> 00:16:54.159 scene then phased at a friendly library. She said, the 342 00:16:54.200 --> 00:16:56.559 stories do you settled differently depending on how you lean? 343 00:16:57.279 --> 00:16:59.519 Her eyes glinted, though she quickly turned to scold two 344 00:16:59.559 --> 00:17:02.759 children rough housing by the dictionary. Stand for my part, 345 00:17:02.840 --> 00:17:04.960 I grew more attached to the vary uncertainty that had 346 00:17:05.000 --> 00:17:07.599 first and settled me. I watched duoteenages dispute the order 347 00:17:07.640 --> 00:17:10.519 of a poetry anthology's table of contents, the winner perhaps 348 00:17:10.599 --> 00:17:13.920 being whichever one belief just a little harder. Returning home 349 00:17:13.920 --> 00:17:16.599 that afternoon, I leave through the older, sloppy of volumes 350 00:17:16.640 --> 00:17:19.119 of my loger, noting places where, even in youth I 351 00:17:19.160 --> 00:17:21.519 had recorded small changes that at the time seemed only 352 00:17:21.559 --> 00:17:25.000 the usual fog of memory. Now in retrospect, they formed 353 00:17:25.000 --> 00:17:28.160 an emerging misaic one. Had the town's founding dick slipped 354 00:17:28.160 --> 00:17:31.279 from eighteen forty seven to eighteen forty eight in various pamphlets? 355 00:17:31.680 --> 00:17:33.640 Why did the recipes for a ripoint britt call for 356 00:17:33.680 --> 00:17:36.839 both molasses and honey depending on whose grandmother had most 357 00:17:36.839 --> 00:17:40.599 recently visited the archive? The clues now came not just 358 00:17:40.640 --> 00:17:42.559 in new books or missing stories, but in the texture 359 00:17:42.559 --> 00:17:45.200 of the Blacer communal palmsist were written in quiet and 360 00:17:45.279 --> 00:17:48.640 observable increments. The collection was not a monument. It was 361 00:17:48.680 --> 00:17:51.559 a garden. I found myself smiling as I wrote to 362 00:17:51.599 --> 00:17:54.880 live in red points, to keep tending the stack asterisk. 363 00:17:55.240 --> 00:17:57.359 It was a chill, misty afternoon when I decided to 364 00:17:57.400 --> 00:18:01.359 dig deeper. Rumors had long swirled among attentive patrons about 365 00:18:01.400 --> 00:18:05.160 a hidden arcave beneath the library's old reference desk. Whispers 366 00:18:05.200 --> 00:18:07.960 of an ancient ledger pre digital handriton by a librarian 367 00:18:07.960 --> 00:18:10.880 whose own memory outlasted any technology had lingered for as 368 00:18:10.920 --> 00:18:14.000 long as I coovcal. I approached Missus Cavanagh as she 369 00:18:14.079 --> 00:18:16.920 labeled new poetry books to tasks she performed with ceremonial care. 370 00:18:17.559 --> 00:18:19.400 I'd like to look in the old reference room desk. 371 00:18:19.519 --> 00:18:21.720 If I may for research folk or section. I have 372 00:18:21.759 --> 00:18:25.119 a hunch she made a face, But relent it. You're 373 00:18:25.119 --> 00:18:27.559 as qualified as anyone if you find the missing nineteen 374 00:18:27.599 --> 00:18:30.599 eighty one Annual report, let me know. The archive room 375 00:18:30.599 --> 00:18:33.279 sits at the library's northern edge, a chill tiled alcove 376 00:18:33.359 --> 00:18:36.720 lined with gray metal cabinets. At its heart, the asilent 377 00:18:36.960 --> 00:18:40.079 was the enormous wooden reference desk. Warnsmooth drawers sticking just so, 378 00:18:40.839 --> 00:18:44.680 I rummished, gingerly, pausing to admire the fading flables nineteen 379 00:18:44.720 --> 00:18:48.039 seventeen Survivors less a turner's in that census, A walker's 380 00:18:48.039 --> 00:18:51.519 card catalog. The back metal drawer, nearly welded by decades 381 00:18:51.559 --> 00:18:54.559 of dust, opened grudgingly within lay a thick green ledger, 382 00:18:54.599 --> 00:18:56.960 cracked at the spine, scold in four different scripts, its 383 00:18:57.000 --> 00:19:00.039 pages faintly redolent of clothes and must I opened the 384 00:19:00.119 --> 00:19:03.519 cover on the fly leaf Red Point Memorial Library Catalog 385 00:19:03.559 --> 00:19:06.920 cumult of Record nineteen sixteen, nineteen seventy eight. It was 386 00:19:06.960 --> 00:19:10.440 a marvel, a master list of books acquired withdrawn relocated. 387 00:19:11.160 --> 00:19:14.759 Each line consisted of title, author, call number, date at 388 00:19:14.799 --> 00:19:17.559 it was attracted, but also scattered between the official notation, 389 00:19:17.640 --> 00:19:22.039 personal notes, cryptic instructions, tiny debates, and overlapping hands. A 390 00:19:22.079 --> 00:19:25.000 sample entry for a missin volume called The Green Atlas 391 00:19:25.680 --> 00:19:28.319 moved three hundred four point eight hundred twenty one slash 392 00:19:28.400 --> 00:19:32.039 rpl six slash seventy one reads one line in another 393 00:19:32.079 --> 00:19:35.119 hand marriage w slash, Mariner's Guide threes last seventy four 394 00:19:35.160 --> 00:19:38.880 c P two hundred nine per consensus, three signatures in 395 00:19:38.920 --> 00:19:42.279 different incs. Four Hammer of the Fog and note pages 396 00:19:42.279 --> 00:19:44.880 two hundred threeman is two hundred six changed. New appendix 397 00:19:44.920 --> 00:19:48.519 added for DeWitt. Some listings were bizally and familiar Birds 398 00:19:48.559 --> 00:19:51.799 of the Western Pines j A. Cross five hundred ninety 399 00:19:51.799 --> 00:19:54.079 eight point one hundred thirty six removed to close stack 400 00:19:54.160 --> 00:19:58.400 never return per Messe, nineteen seventy six. For others, personal 401 00:19:58.559 --> 00:20:01.000