WEBVTT 1 00:00:05.000 --> 00:00:06.919 The night hid the city above the low hum of 2 00:00:06.919 --> 00:00:09.119 its street lights and traffic muffled by layers of stone 3 00:00:09.119 --> 00:00:13.560 and shelving. Only the library's basement remained awake. Fluorescence burst overhead, 4 00:00:13.599 --> 00:00:16.640 reflected in polish concrete, and the air was comfortably thick 5 00:00:16.679 --> 00:00:19.600 with dust in the paperies and of old bindings. I'd 6 00:00:19.600 --> 00:00:22.359 reshove this section just yesterday. The entire days for ages 7 00:00:22.359 --> 00:00:24.399 made a game of how efficiently I could restore older 8 00:00:24.480 --> 00:00:27.679 to decades of donations and weeding projects. So when my 9 00:00:27.719 --> 00:00:30.120 fingers closed on a batted, slim volume out of place 10 00:00:30.120 --> 00:00:33.000 on the lowest shelf, face in spine faded almost blanket, 11 00:00:33.039 --> 00:00:35.520 was as jarring as a familiar song played scordantly out 12 00:00:35.560 --> 00:00:39.320 of tune, I drew without squinting at its cover. Centennial 13 00:00:39.359 --> 00:00:43.240 Supplement Provisional Catalog, twenty seventy three. The year glared at me, 14 00:00:43.359 --> 00:00:46.880 impossibly bold for something so old and tatter below our 15 00:00:46.920 --> 00:00:49.799 libraries in Sydney was debussed, along with a small archaic 16 00:00:49.880 --> 00:00:53.000 date stamper feature phased out years ago. The books edges 17 00:00:53.000 --> 00:00:55.960 were culled from use. As I turned it in my hands, 18 00:00:55.960 --> 00:00:59.079 its pages made a faint rattling sound, not unlike dried leaves. 19 00:00:59.719 --> 00:01:01.880 For a few seconds, I tried to remember if this 20 00:01:02.000 --> 00:01:04.079 was a prop from one of the High Skull's theater groups, 21 00:01:04.400 --> 00:01:06.040 or if it had ever come up in our quarterly 22 00:01:06.120 --> 00:01:09.079 Lost or Van Binn. But neither option made sense. I 23 00:01:09.200 --> 00:01:11.599 balanced the book carefully on my arm, kneeling on the 24 00:01:11.599 --> 00:01:13.959 cold tiwl to get another look at its spine. The 25 00:01:14.040 --> 00:01:16.120 where matched the rest of the shelf. These were always 26 00:01:16.120 --> 00:01:19.680 the musties least traveled stacks, but the titles claim sat 27 00:01:19.680 --> 00:01:22.680 stubbin in my chest. The current year was only twenty 28 00:01:22.719 --> 00:01:25.480 twenty three. There had been some chatter two weeks ago 29 00:01:25.599 --> 00:01:28.359 about sprucing up for our libraries approaching eighty fifth, but 30 00:01:28.400 --> 00:01:30.799 no one here, not amor not even Rosa, had said 31 00:01:30.799 --> 00:01:34.079 a word about planning for the centennial. And yet flipping 32 00:01:34.079 --> 00:01:37.519 through the opening leaves, I found familiar names. Rosa Dauberscu 33 00:01:37.760 --> 00:01:42.079 listed as Emeritis Ororo History now retired, Jamie Kevanaugh Technology 34 00:01:42.120 --> 00:01:45.719 Services twenty forty eight, twenty sixty nine, Amersar Head Archivist 35 00:01:45.760 --> 00:01:49.439 twenty seventeen, twenty forty now late, and myself avelin special 36 00:01:49.480 --> 00:01:53.000 Collections Emeritis. I have heard a finger over each, noting 37 00:01:53.000 --> 00:01:55.040 the way birth dates and jaw dates had been overtight, 38 00:01:55.200 --> 00:01:58.319 then corrected with careful edits. My stomach twisted with the 39 00:01:58.400 --> 00:02:01.439 uncomfortable pleasure of see myself as well, not old exactly, 40 00:02:01.519 --> 00:02:06.120 but finished someone looking back. Even the preface was drawingly 41 00:02:06.159 --> 00:02:09.639 specific to the loyal staff of Landmark City Library on 42 00:02:09.680 --> 00:02:11.879 the occasion of our hundred year are thanks to those 43 00:02:11.879 --> 00:02:15.159 whose memories have become our archive. The signature matched the 44 00:02:15.159 --> 00:02:17.240 elgant scroll of a director I'd worked under as a 45 00:02:17.280 --> 00:02:20.360 fresh growd assistant, now long departed for a university post. 46 00:02:21.080 --> 00:02:23.280 The names, the logo, the seal. They were all right, 47 00:02:23.400 --> 00:02:26.439 but wrong in their context. I abandoned my cart and 48 00:02:26.439 --> 00:02:28.400 took the battered catalog to the work room, where my 49 00:02:28.400 --> 00:02:31.479 phone was charging on the batted metal desk. First, I 50 00:02:31.520 --> 00:02:34.120 tried scanning the barcode on the back cover. Nothing, not 51 00:02:34.280 --> 00:02:37.120 even a misfile in our digital system. The only blip 52 00:02:37.159 --> 00:02:39.400 was a curious invalid code prompt, as though the database 53 00:02:39.439 --> 00:02:42.919 was politely refusing to admit the possibility. Next, I flipped 54 00:02:42.960 --> 00:02:45.240 to the back, looking for the old accession records we 55 00:02:45.280 --> 00:02:48.560 sometimes scribbled and pencil. There was nothing, only a single 56 00:02:48.560 --> 00:02:52.639 ink notation preshlved see centennial Holdings. I checked our online 57 00:02:52.719 --> 00:02:56.240 archives entering centennial supplement, Then every permutation I could dink 58 00:02:56.280 --> 00:02:59.879 to try, no hits, not even in the special projects folder. 59 00:03:00.080 --> 00:03:02.599 Or Damie would occasionally upload sample tempests for next gen 60 00:03:02.680 --> 00:03:06.199 record formats. Absently, I ran a thumb over the mossed 61 00:03:06.199 --> 00:03:09.759 seal on the cover the library's oldest logo, rarely used 62 00:03:09.759 --> 00:03:12.479 since the redesign a decade ago. For a while, I 63 00:03:12.560 --> 00:03:15.000 just sat cattalog on my lap, feeling the hum of 64 00:03:15.039 --> 00:03:16.520 the lights and the shift of quiet air through the 65 00:03:16.520 --> 00:03:20.319 old ductruk. Was I tired and missing something obvious? Or 66 00:03:20.400 --> 00:03:23.039 was someone, maybe Jamie, with his love for testing my patients, 67 00:03:23.039 --> 00:03:25.520 trying to get me to bite. I set the catalog 68 00:03:25.599 --> 00:03:27.840 in my station's bottom drawer, beside the lost badge bin 69 00:03:27.879 --> 00:03:30.360 and the half eaten chocolate bar, hesitated and slid it 70 00:03:30.400 --> 00:03:33.240 farther to the back, just in case i'd ask in 71 00:03:33.240 --> 00:03:36.000 the morning. Surely someone would know where such an oddity blonde, 72 00:03:36.120 --> 00:03:39.680 or at least offer a plausible reason for its existence. Upstairs, 73 00:03:39.759 --> 00:03:42.319 The library's polishing has always felt like a separate world. 74 00:03:43.039 --> 00:03:46.039 Marble floors, pillows frame in sunlight walkways, the echo of 75 00:03:46.080 --> 00:03:49.280 children's voices in the reading loft, but below in the 76 00:03:49.400 --> 00:03:53.199 archives and technical workrooms, the move was low. I'd fallen 77 00:03:53.240 --> 00:03:55.120 in love with the way the buildings seemed to stretch 78 00:03:55.120 --> 00:03:57.360 in all directions. Rooms that peered on blueprints but not 79 00:03:57.400 --> 00:04:00.199 on foot, rolling shelves with handriton touch from before my time. 80 00:04:00.800 --> 00:04:02.759 My days were steady by Richal. The first cup of 81 00:04:02.759 --> 00:04:05.080 coffee at an unreasonably early hour, the low rattle of 82 00:04:05.120 --> 00:04:07.520 carts loaded with rare volumes, the cold bite of the 83 00:04:07.520 --> 00:04:10.680 morning as I reviewed preservation locks, and a quiet camaraderie 84 00:04:10.680 --> 00:04:13.800 of staff lunches in the window's kitchen. Inventory day again, 85 00:04:13.879 --> 00:04:17.759 Ava Rose asked that morning, smiling over a Topowervi egg salad, 86 00:04:17.839 --> 00:04:20.399 her hair pulled back with a scarf pattern like clouded glass. 87 00:04:21.120 --> 00:04:23.680 Rosa had been here almost as long as the bricks themselves, 88 00:04:23.920 --> 00:04:26.360 or so she said in her memory. The library it survived, 89 00:04:26.399 --> 00:04:29.519 municipal storms and a generation of underfunding, all chronicled in 90 00:04:29.560 --> 00:04:33.079 her stories. Ammer arrived with his customary stack of annoittive 91 00:04:33.120 --> 00:04:36.319 folders and a thermist that always smelled a spicy burnt coffee. 92 00:04:36.759 --> 00:04:38.879 You'll have worn down your knees on those basement tiles 93 00:04:38.879 --> 00:04:41.399 by sixty, he teased, dropping a folder on the table 94 00:04:41.439 --> 00:04:44.079 and stretching, Or are you simply finding things none of 95 00:04:44.160 --> 00:04:47.040 us can remember? Why are there never fewer books, just 96 00:04:47.079 --> 00:04:51.160 stranger ones? Jamie chanmed in, already half distracted, peering at 97 00:04:51.160 --> 00:04:54.240 his phone. Jamie was still young enough for caffeine jitters 98 00:04:54.240 --> 00:04:56.680 and the playful optimism that heccurred to deep like the archives. 99 00:04:57.279 --> 00:04:59.600 His pet theory was that realities sometimes glitched in a 100 00:04:59.639 --> 00:05:02.000 cattleg and I've long since learned not to ask for 101 00:05:02.000 --> 00:05:04.680 a precise definition. Part of the joy of working at 102 00:05:04.720 --> 00:05:07.480 Landmark was the randomness. Sometimes a box of red books 103 00:05:07.480 --> 00:05:09.319 would surface in shipping, marked from a don and no 104 00:05:09.360 --> 00:05:12.279 one recognized, but Poor smoked locally. Sometimes a shelf would 105 00:05:12.279 --> 00:05:14.439 collapse and out with Poor a clutch of often photographs 106 00:05:14.439 --> 00:05:17.120 from the nineteen sixties. Once a patter of Veerlin case 107 00:05:17.120 --> 00:05:19.199 would sheet music in Romanian turned up just as a 108 00:05:19.240 --> 00:05:22.079 touring treo arrived for a pop up concert. There was 109 00:05:22.120 --> 00:05:24.199 the founder's note, a cubby rumor to be carved out 110 00:05:24.199 --> 00:05:26.439 behind a sealed book case in the oldest when everyone 111 00:05:26.439 --> 00:05:29.160 agreed it existed, no one agreed on its precise location. 112 00:05:29.800 --> 00:05:31.600 At the west stair will hung a yellow portrait of 113 00:05:31.639 --> 00:05:35.920 the library's founder as humorless, mustas brushed flat. The story 114 00:05:36.040 --> 00:05:38.720 went that the painted disliked books and quietly cursed the frame, 115 00:05:38.800 --> 00:05:40.600 so anyone who lingered too long in front of it 116 00:05:40.600 --> 00:05:44.000 would misremember what color the founder's tir had been. Downstairs, 117 00:05:44.079 --> 00:05:47.879 the basement was my preferred domain. Dull concrete bulwarks, narrow 118 00:05:47.959 --> 00:05:50.720 rooms with labels etched and faded marker, rolling shelves that 119 00:05:50.800 --> 00:05:53.680 crowned with every nudge. There were zones even the longest 120 00:05:53.680 --> 00:05:56.120 serving staff avoided a corrid or sealed with caution tape 121 00:05:56.160 --> 00:05:58.480 after a burst steam pipe. In the eighties, saxis could 122 00:05:58.560 --> 00:06:01.120 linger in immemory, but long since placed. The earliest chlvies 123 00:06:01.199 --> 00:06:03.879 still bore shop dates fifty two sixty seven sum with 124 00:06:03.959 --> 00:06:06.040 a rows and notes like a label with new catalog 125 00:06:06.720 --> 00:06:10.560 maintenance door sport had faded stencils, returned route only for shelving. 126 00:06:10.600 --> 00:06:13.360 Hold a survey. None of the new staff could say 127 00:06:13.360 --> 00:06:15.160 for sure which doors led by. It was easy to 128 00:06:15.160 --> 00:06:18.759 get trapped in memory, wandering amid other people's priorities. Our 129 00:06:18.800 --> 00:06:21.199 lunch stretched out in the usual way. Rosa sharing stories 130 00:06:21.199 --> 00:06:23.680 about donors who'd given books that went quite books, Amma 131 00:06:23.759 --> 00:06:27.879 comparing statistics of borrowing patterns across decades. I waited until 132 00:06:27.920 --> 00:06:30.560 the conversation turned to her spat between the teen volunteers 133 00:06:30.560 --> 00:06:32.879 in the poetry group, before asking, as casually as I 134 00:06:32.959 --> 00:06:36.120 could anyone remember anything about a centennial supplement as in 135 00:06:36.199 --> 00:06:39.560 a provisional catalog for the one hundredth year. Rose's eyebrows 136 00:06:39.639 --> 00:06:44.360 drew together. She frowned, centennial, Oh dear, the library's not 137 00:06:44.399 --> 00:06:46.279 that old, not yet. Did you find a proposal in 138 00:06:46.279 --> 00:06:48.480 the director's files. We talked about a garden a time 139 00:06:48.600 --> 00:06:50.839 or two, but it never got off the ground. She 140 00:06:50.920 --> 00:06:53.439 looked almost apologetic, as if failing to conjure up a 141 00:06:53.519 --> 00:06:57.040 memory was a mine embarrassment. Alma looked up mouth twisting 142 00:06:57.079 --> 00:07:00.839 integrin someone getting ambitious in their retirement planning, cause you're 143 00:07:00.839 --> 00:07:02.759 all still stuck with me at the next twenty five 144 00:07:03.360 --> 00:07:06.720 could be a workshop project, Jamie suggested, knuckles tap in 145 00:07:06.759 --> 00:07:09.519 the table in a syncopated rhysm, you know, like last 146 00:07:09.600 --> 00:07:13.120 year's future as catalogs class or a prank. Maybe any barcodes. 147 00:07:13.720 --> 00:07:15.680 His eyes lit up at the thought of an unsolved case. 148 00:07:16.439 --> 00:07:20.399 Scannet did that, I said, The system literally split it 149 00:07:20.439 --> 00:07:23.720 back at me. Rosa just patted my hand. If the 150 00:07:23.720 --> 00:07:26.319 shells start showing you the future, dear ask them where 151 00:07:26.319 --> 00:07:28.839 I left my keys. I managed to smile, but the 152 00:07:28.879 --> 00:07:32.199 account I left me more curious and unsettled. After clocking 153 00:07:32.199 --> 00:07:34.199 in for the afternoon shift, I ducked back into the 154 00:07:34.199 --> 00:07:36.560 work room and propped the catalog open beside my laptop. 155 00:07:37.040 --> 00:07:39.199 This time I picked a random listing from the supplements 156 00:07:39.199 --> 00:07:43.360 detance matrix of annotations photographs Mayor's gale at twenty sixty eight, 157 00:07:43.439 --> 00:07:47.480 mainfoy at seven thousand, one hundred twenty three format, digital, slash, 158 00:07:47.560 --> 00:07:50.839 ar keevilprint. I searched our holdings, both digital and physical. 159 00:07:50.879 --> 00:07:53.600 No such accession, no photos, no mention of a gala 160 00:07:53.639 --> 00:07:56.600 that year, either in newspaper archives or city events locks. 161 00:07:57.199 --> 00:07:59.480 The strangest bit was the name of the mayor, Michael Cheu. 162 00:08:00.160 --> 00:08:02.079 The term mayor was more startling than the name. It 163 00:08:02.120 --> 00:08:05.560 belonged to a current high school junior. The catalogs entry 164 00:08:05.560 --> 00:08:08.519 swung between plausible and uncanny. There were a list of 165 00:08:08.560 --> 00:08:11.000 books about city history attributed to people had met at 166 00:08:11.040 --> 00:08:13.600 local readings who hadn't yet published more than a panphlet 167 00:08:14.319 --> 00:08:17.519 accounts of our chosen installations were reconvened during a jubilee. 168 00:08:18.000 --> 00:08:20.279 Even casual listings a memoir by some one arm are 169 00:08:20.319 --> 00:08:22.800 often cited as a workplace legend, described as already a 170 00:08:22.879 --> 00:08:25.560 late and much missed. Had I simply stumbled upon a 171 00:08:25.600 --> 00:08:28.680 document of wishes so fantasy of retirements and legacies to come? 172 00:08:29.240 --> 00:08:32.639 The contradictions ran deeper the Morrow traced them. Some less 173 00:08:32.639 --> 00:08:36.240 included staff byself included as emeritis, while others placed present 174 00:08:36.279 --> 00:08:41.159 colleagues as retired, relocated, married, deceased. The specificity of dates 175 00:08:41.159 --> 00:08:43.440 and names was dizzing. Who would bother to fabricate the 176 00:08:43.440 --> 00:08:46.399 evolution of an entire building this thoroughly. By the time 177 00:08:46.440 --> 00:08:49.159 the afternoon sun had called into evening, shadows filtered through 178 00:08:49.159 --> 00:08:51.919 the topmost windows, turning the stacks of shade of blue gray, 179 00:08:52.080 --> 00:08:55.919 My frustration had fermented into a sharper curiosity. The next morning, 180 00:08:56.200 --> 00:08:58.480 Rosa drifted into the break room as a poor coffee. 181 00:08:58.960 --> 00:09:01.639 She was humming something shape I still dreamy from sleep, 182 00:09:01.799 --> 00:09:05.000 and I seize my moment, Rosa, I'm serious, nothing in 183 00:09:05.080 --> 00:09:08.240 your time here about a centennial supplement or anyone planning one. 184 00:09:08.600 --> 00:09:11.840 This time she shrugged, more sharply than before. I think 185 00:09:12.159 --> 00:09:14.960 maybe there was something about an anniversary display I've seen 186 00:09:15.000 --> 00:09:17.600 fliers for events that never happened. If that's what you mean, 187 00:09:18.159 --> 00:09:22.519 she smiled faintly. Always talk about jubilee celebrations, but no nothing. 188 00:09:22.559 --> 00:09:25.320 As you're describing, what did it look like? I described 189 00:09:25.320 --> 00:09:27.320 the battery's volume, skipping over my own name for the 190 00:09:27.320 --> 00:09:32.159 moment Amer was passing through brief kiss tilted wishall thinking aarva, 191 00:09:32.360 --> 00:09:35.039 he said, If you dig long enough in these stacks, 192 00:09:35.159 --> 00:09:37.200 you'll find a directory for the twenty one hundreds and 193 00:09:37.240 --> 00:09:39.840 a baseball sign by Abraham Lincoln. Just means it's ghost 194 00:09:39.919 --> 00:09:41.600 or someone with too much time. You want me to 195 00:09:41.639 --> 00:09:44.679 pull old stuff meeting notes for you. Jamie, slutched in 196 00:09:44.679 --> 00:09:46.840 the corner by the microwave, was the only one who 197 00:09:46.879 --> 00:09:49.919 registered my excitement. Might be a hacker trick, he said, 198 00:09:50.000 --> 00:09:52.799 echoing one of his favorite explanations for wy Olbject's surface 199 00:09:52.799 --> 00:09:55.200 at the wrong time. Stuff book Club did a thing 200 00:09:55.279 --> 00:09:57.600 last spring, right review entries for books that don't exist. 201 00:09:57.720 --> 00:09:59.799 Some kids took it way too far, or you know, 202 00:10:00.120 --> 00:10:02.840 a manifestation era catalogs are recursive, Hue and put enough 203 00:10:02.840 --> 00:10:05.279 fake staff. The database gets all new ideas about you. 204 00:10:05.919 --> 00:10:08.200 I left them to their theories, but decided, as I 205 00:10:08.240 --> 00:10:10.559 finished my coffee that the only waiter unravel the thing 206 00:10:10.679 --> 00:10:13.399 was to check more entries against reality. There had to 207 00:10:13.440 --> 00:10:15.679 be a point where the fiction cracked. Maybe I'd even 208 00:10:15.679 --> 00:10:18.879 catch sight of forever was responsible chronicling our imagined future 209 00:10:18.879 --> 00:10:21.919 in the slow, inexorable script of bureaucracy. I tipped the 210 00:10:21.960 --> 00:10:24.240 catalog and set up with the cart, trailing stacks of 211 00:10:24.279 --> 00:10:26.639 reference locks and print outs, planning to cross check every 212 00:10:26.639 --> 00:10:29.440 improbable listing that caught my eye. The aisles of the 213 00:10:29.519 --> 00:10:32.919 archives were a familiar landscape, shoving ranges allocated to local history, 214 00:10:33.039 --> 00:10:36.600 city documents, urban planning special collections, each with its oddities 215 00:10:37.240 --> 00:10:40.159 for their local history twenty forty two listing attributed in 216 00:10:40.159 --> 00:10:42.399 the catalog to Way Simmonds. I found no match in 217 00:10:42.440 --> 00:10:45.679 any database, not even in acquisition plans. But I did 218 00:10:45.720 --> 00:10:48.679 recall a prickling, nagging memory, having misshelled the pamphlet with 219 00:10:48.720 --> 00:10:51.159 that author's name just yesterday. Its title a near match. 220 00:10:51.240 --> 00:10:53.879 Growing up on Fort Street, I sped back to the 221 00:10:53.879 --> 00:10:56.639 spot and found it tucked behind a row of technical volumes. 222 00:10:57.320 --> 00:10:59.519 It was then printed in the distinctive form at the 223 00:10:59.559 --> 00:11:02.279 city's Deen writers around table he used for their annual contest, 224 00:11:03.000 --> 00:11:05.000 yet in the main system it was marked as pending 225 00:11:05.039 --> 00:11:08.200 review with no accession date and no borrowing record. A 226 00:11:08.240 --> 00:11:11.480 ghost half we reel. Next a look for art installation, 227 00:11:11.600 --> 00:11:14.759 the Silent Sculpture one D seventy one bronze granite base, 228 00:11:14.919 --> 00:11:18.519 anonymous donor. The digital catalog had not a trace, although 229 00:11:18.519 --> 00:11:21.080 the description was ritual location a note on materials a 230 00:11:21.200 --> 00:11:24.399 claimed unveiling at a jubilee celebration. Out of habit when 231 00:11:24.399 --> 00:11:26.559 dealing with art objects, I checked the lock caoset on 232 00:11:26.600 --> 00:11:29.600 the second cell basement level where records and correspondents about 233 00:11:29.679 --> 00:11:33.360 tentive exhibitions went to die. Sifting through yellow memos I 234 00:11:33.399 --> 00:11:35.759 found a brittle handritten that A proposed an a soundless 235 00:11:35.759 --> 00:11:39.159 sculpture commemorative, non invasive to the gallery environment, dated three 236 00:11:39.200 --> 00:11:42.279 decade prior of the materials matched. The letter was stamped 237 00:11:42.360 --> 00:11:44.440 never approved, but I was dropped by the congruents. Not 238 00:11:44.480 --> 00:11:47.759 a copy but a ghostly resonance. The most jarring discovery 239 00:11:47.799 --> 00:11:50.480 camile hunting for a children's book Timekeeper's Day gift from 240 00:11:50.519 --> 00:11:54.039 future mayor. The inscribed volume was peculiar. The dournalist did 241 00:11:54.039 --> 00:11:55.840 was the same teenage two named as made in the 242 00:11:55.879 --> 00:11:59.240 catalog's fictional future. Yet sitting out of place in the 243 00:11:59.279 --> 00:12:02.679 returns bin was pristine, brand new edition, vivid illustration shining 244 00:12:02.720 --> 00:12:06.039 through the plane wrapper, inside an inscription in careful block 245 00:12:06.120 --> 00:12:09.240 letters to Landmark City Library, May your stories lost forever? 246 00:12:09.320 --> 00:12:12.360 Michael Chugh, twenty twenty three. When I searched the borrow 247 00:12:12.399 --> 00:12:15.840 and database, there was no history attached, no holes, no reservations, 248 00:12:16.080 --> 00:12:18.720 nothing except a short note in Jamie's hand, brand new 249 00:12:18.960 --> 00:12:22.559 donor a student police shelveing children. Back at the workroom table, 250 00:12:22.639 --> 00:12:24.919 I lined up the pamphlet, the letter, and the inscribed 251 00:12:24.919 --> 00:12:28.000 picture book, considering each in turn. When people say the 252 00:12:28.000 --> 00:12:30.799 impossible is built on a series of minor plausible steps, 253 00:12:31.000 --> 00:12:33.080 usually it's just a way of excusing their own attention. 254 00:12:33.320 --> 00:12:35.840 But here the impossibility seemed to sprout from the plausible, 255 00:12:36.080 --> 00:12:39.240 like mushrooms pushing through dirt overnight. I Pepper Damer and 256 00:12:39.320 --> 00:12:43.480 Rosa with fall up questions. Ahmer rolled his eyes Urban 257 00:12:43.559 --> 00:12:46.080 mas O. Every place is them. People claim we hosted 258 00:12:46.080 --> 00:12:48.759 some my secret readings years ago, but all the rememberers 259 00:12:48.799 --> 00:12:51.159 the punch. Probably someone wrote all this as a prank 260 00:12:51.200 --> 00:12:54.320 for a future celebration and then forgot about it. Rosa 261 00:12:54.399 --> 00:12:56.799 was less dismissive. I remember when we first talked about 262 00:12:56.799 --> 00:12:59.399 the citywide celebration. The Mayor's Gala was supposed to happen. 263 00:12:59.440 --> 00:13:01.399 The funds never if it came through. Maybe in another 264 00:13:01.519 --> 00:13:04.679 timeline Darling were famous for it, but not this one. Besides, 265 00:13:04.759 --> 00:13:07.000 you can't trust everything you dig up in busments. Sometimes 266 00:13:07.000 --> 00:13:09.120 the building remembers things that never made it to paper. 267 00:13:09.679 --> 00:13:13.159 The contradictions were mending. I found margin notes scattered throughout 268 00:13:13.200 --> 00:13:16.679 the catalog, trails of incrawling beside entries, adjusting names, adding 269 00:13:16.679 --> 00:13:19.799 what looked like were scheduling notations, a few boil looped, 270 00:13:19.799 --> 00:13:22.679 and letterforms serially similar to my own recent handwriting, as 271 00:13:22.679 --> 00:13:25.320 though I'd annotated something in a sleep woroking fit referencing 272 00:13:25.320 --> 00:13:28.879 future shelving and proposed projects twenty sixty sixty nine. But 273 00:13:28.960 --> 00:13:31.360 I had never worked on such a list. Nothing in 274 00:13:31.360 --> 00:13:34.440 the staff communications or minutes hinted at plants, entennial events, 275 00:13:34.759 --> 00:13:37.799 just the barest bones of programs and catalog language, like 276 00:13:37.879 --> 00:13:41.000 ripples from a stone fur and somewhere upstream in time. Then, 277 00:13:41.279 --> 00:13:44.159 late one afternoon, as rain flattened against the windows above, 278 00:13:44.279 --> 00:13:46.120 I found a photograph wedged in the corner of a 279 00:13:46.159 --> 00:13:48.320 shelf in the archives of faded directed or labeled book 280 00:13:48.320 --> 00:13:50.840 Fair twenty twenty eight, a year still five years ahead. 281 00:13:51.519 --> 00:13:53.759 It showed the central lobby flooded with pale green light, 282 00:13:53.840 --> 00:13:56.159 banners drooping from the upper balustrade, and a mural I 283 00:13:56.159 --> 00:13:58.919 couldn't place an abstract map, perhaps shifting with the lines 284 00:13:58.960 --> 00:14:02.159 of the wall. Furda looked well aged, curling at the edges. 285 00:14:02.200 --> 00:14:04.240 The in color shifted in the whale to violate years 286 00:14:04.240 --> 00:14:07.759 will do it shouldn't exist, not outside of someone's anticipation 287 00:14:07.879 --> 00:14:10.960 or fantasy. Their obvious question was this all some elaborate 288 00:14:11.000 --> 00:14:15.039 staging persisted, but every new artifact posed its own challenge. 289 00:14:15.600 --> 00:14:17.519 If it was a prank, it was thorough and subtle. 290 00:14:18.120 --> 00:14:21.000 If the events were so unremarkable as to escape anyone's memory, 291 00:14:21.200 --> 00:14:24.919 why would the matting Artovac's pamphlets, photos correspondences exist in 292 00:14:24.960 --> 00:14:27.879 such piecemeal, out of place fashion. In the staff meeting 293 00:14:27.879 --> 00:14:29.879 minutes for the past decade, there were no references to 294 00:14:29.919 --> 00:14:33.039 centennial planning, no committee a ssignments, no budget lines for 295 00:14:33.159 --> 00:14:36.600 silent sculptures or gala films. But here and there turnings 296 00:14:36.600 --> 00:14:39.240 of phrase mirrored the catalog. A project draft for story 297 00:14:39.320 --> 00:14:43.200 Keeper's decade, A proposal for Lobby Mural's anniversary celebrations details 298 00:14:43.240 --> 00:14:46.279 t b D. What if these catalog entries were artifacts 299 00:14:46.279 --> 00:14:49.320 of conversations that never grew into action. Were we just 300 00:14:49.320 --> 00:14:52.159 seeing echoes of rejected ideas? Or was there something weird 301 00:14:52.240 --> 00:14:55.120 or burrowed within the stacks? Even I began to feel 302 00:14:55.120 --> 00:14:57.960 my resolved shifting more often, I found myself hesitating before 303 00:14:57.960 --> 00:15:00.159 moving a cart or clearing an odd item, wondering if 304 00:15:00.200 --> 00:15:01.799 it might be the seat of a future listing, or 305 00:15:01.840 --> 00:15:04.120 if I was seeing evidence after the fact, my perception 306 00:15:04.200 --> 00:15:07.240 colored by the catalog's presence. After a few days spent 307 00:15:07.320 --> 00:15:09.360 half in the world of daily tasks and half mid 308 00:15:09.360 --> 00:15:12.000 in a catalog's riddles, my skepticism gave way to a 309 00:15:12.000 --> 00:15:14.840 stubborn urge for clarity. If this were a prank, it 310 00:15:14.919 --> 00:15:16.919 was one years in the making, designed only for the 311 00:15:16.960 --> 00:15:19.360 person obsessive enough to try tracing it to its ends. 312 00:15:20.039 --> 00:15:22.279 If it was an error, it was the luckiest concatenation 313 00:15:22.360 --> 00:15:26.679 of half remembered institutional history and misfeld memorabilia. Yet everywhere 314 00:15:26.720 --> 00:15:29.039 Turran the catalog felt less like a failed record and 315 00:15:29.080 --> 00:15:31.159 more like a document of what could be the possibilities 316 00:15:31.159 --> 00:15:34.879 stacked beside the certainties. Rosa, when pressed again, told a 317 00:15:34.919 --> 00:15:38.639 story I'd never heard. Oh that sculpture, she said, when 318 00:15:38.679 --> 00:15:40.919 I showed her the proposal letter. I remember it being 319 00:15:40.960 --> 00:15:44.799 there just once, probably two adversaries back big, she emphasized, 320 00:15:44.840 --> 00:15:47.200 tracing a curve in the air bronze like a pile 321 00:15:47.240 --> 00:15:50.080 of open books, did disappear, then disappeared, just as quietly. 322 00:15:50.159 --> 00:15:52.639 I always figured it was unloan from the modern. When 323 00:15:52.639 --> 00:15:56.600 I asked the amor, he blinked here, misremembering, Rosa, you 324 00:15:56.679 --> 00:15:59.399 told me yourself the city never approved the commission. I'd 325 00:15:59.399 --> 00:16:01.919 have noticed ulpture blocking my reference desk For a week, 326 00:16:02.519 --> 00:16:05.080 I found myself cornered by Jamie, who hung around after 327 00:16:05.080 --> 00:16:08.039 closing one night. So do you think the entries or 328 00:16:08.039 --> 00:16:11.240 predictions are more like mirrors? He asked, his voice almost reverent, 329 00:16:11.879 --> 00:16:14.000 because the photos are maybe fake, but they look and 330 00:16:14.039 --> 00:16:16.440 feel right. It's like the kettle of doesn't care about sequence, 331 00:16:16.600 --> 00:16:19.799 just about attention. Like whatever you care about gets remembered harder. 332 00:16:20.320 --> 00:16:22.480 He flipped open the batted volume and ran a finger 333 00:16:22.519 --> 00:16:25.039 knelt down a column of entries. What if we're making 334 00:16:25.120 --> 00:16:27.720 it true just by checking the thought gave me chills, 335 00:16:27.799 --> 00:16:29.720 but in a good way, the kind of tingle curiosity 336 00:16:29.799 --> 00:16:33.399 leaves behind. I tried another tack, emilling the City Historical 337 00:16:33.440 --> 00:16:36.679 Society for references in their ledges. Nothing. A quick search 338 00:16:36.720 --> 00:16:39.120 for digitized city records yielded not a single mention of 339 00:16:39.159 --> 00:16:42.279 a centennial event or committee, not even in optimistic ideas 340 00:16:42.279 --> 00:16:44.360 for the future members that jamped every planning folder I'd 341 00:16:44.399 --> 00:16:48.399 ever proused. With each revelation, the familiar world shifted. Small 342 00:16:48.480 --> 00:16:50.840 artifacts seemed more pregnant with meaning, as if I had 343 00:16:50.840 --> 00:16:53.039 overlooked a system that only revealed its workings in the 344 00:16:53.080 --> 00:16:56.240 right frame of mind. Was our record in complete? Or 345 00:16:56.320 --> 00:16:58.159 was the cattle of drawing from some well of happenings 346 00:16:58.200 --> 00:17:00.960 I alone couldn't recall? What if these signs appeared for 347 00:17:01.000 --> 00:17:03.840 each person prime to recognize them. At that point my 348 00:17:03.919 --> 00:17:07.440 curiosity chain shape. I was no longer towling evidence against 349 00:17:07.480 --> 00:17:10.599 the catalog's claims in order to disprove it. Instead, I 350 00:17:10.640 --> 00:17:13.400 began to map out each impossible prediction, building a spreadsheet 351 00:17:13.400 --> 00:17:16.599 that tracked every entry, artifact, and memory against locations within 352 00:17:16.640 --> 00:17:19.880 the library. If I could document the congruences, perhaps I 353 00:17:20.000 --> 00:17:21.759 catched the pattern as it took shape an dissipate the 354 00:17:21.799 --> 00:17:24.279 appearance of the next startifact see the boundary between the 355 00:17:24.319 --> 00:17:27.480 imagined and the shelters. It blowed into something touchable. My 356 00:17:27.559 --> 00:17:30.200 motive had shifted, not to solve the impossibility, but to 357 00:17:30.200 --> 00:17:33.400 witness its unfolding. A week into my mapping, the impossible 358 00:17:33.480 --> 00:17:35.640 arrived in the form of a crate if blocked the 359 00:17:35.720 --> 00:17:38.440 narrow corridor between the supply room and all teachers large 360 00:17:38.440 --> 00:17:40.880 a space use so really we'd long since stopped stacking 361 00:17:40.920 --> 00:17:44.279 supplies there. The crate was oak heavy, its sides paneled 362 00:17:44.279 --> 00:17:47.279 and secured with brass over hinges old by age. There 363 00:17:47.319 --> 00:17:49.559 was a single yellowing label fixed to the lid, being 364 00:17:49.599 --> 00:17:54.160 faded almost to invisibility, an Adversary sculpture Centennial twenty seventy three. 365 00:17:54.599 --> 00:17:56.839 I recognized the typeface, a font we'd only begun to 366 00:17:56.920 --> 00:17:59.920 use in the past few years for official event materials. 367 00:18:00.000 --> 00:18:02.960 Stood there, backed by a sickly flicker from the overhead fixtures, 368 00:18:03.079 --> 00:18:05.319 running a palm over splinters that flaked under my touch. 369 00:18:06.039 --> 00:18:08.200 Jamie joined me, lugging a tool kit he claimed to 370 00:18:08.200 --> 00:18:10.759 have found beside the reference desk. With a bit of 371 00:18:10.799 --> 00:18:13.240 joint effort and a lot of cautious wiggling, we levered 372 00:18:13.240 --> 00:18:16.640 the crate open. Inside, swaddled in layers of moth edenfelt 373 00:18:16.759 --> 00:18:19.880 was a bronze sculpture, books twisted amid opening spines, braided 374 00:18:19.880 --> 00:18:22.640 in nets of stamp words. Some of the titles and 375 00:18:22.680 --> 00:18:25.599 scread across the surfaces were familiar, the memoir, the art exhibit, 376 00:18:25.640 --> 00:18:29.039 the children's book. Other names they didn't recognize, not even 377 00:18:29.039 --> 00:18:32.000 as jokes. All along the base a phrase as etch 378 00:18:32.079 --> 00:18:36.079 to knowledge boundlism. Before the entire sculpture's surfaces were dappled, 379 00:18:36.119 --> 00:18:38.400 textured so that the bronze flashed with greenish and gold 380 00:18:38.400 --> 00:18:41.480 pattern in the torches. Beam Rosa found us there, blinking 381 00:18:41.519 --> 00:18:43.920 at the cray. She put her hands on her hips 382 00:18:43.920 --> 00:18:47.000 and side a smile fighting its way upward. I told you, 383 00:18:47.119 --> 00:18:51.160 there it is, she said, almost kindly, exasperated, backward always 384 00:18:51.160 --> 00:18:54.039 was before someone decided it didn't fit the gallery. Jamie 385 00:18:54.079 --> 00:18:57.039 crouched to study the inscription, then nodded utterly, non blast, 386 00:18:57.640 --> 00:19:00.319 It's always been in storage, right, just in a different room. 387 00:19:00.400 --> 00:19:03.160 I carried it to the lowing bay. Three months ago. Almer, 388 00:19:03.279 --> 00:19:05.759 summoned in his usual deliberate way, took one looking swore 389 00:19:05.759 --> 00:19:09.240 softly no, I'd have remembered something like this, something heavy. 390 00:19:09.319 --> 00:19:11.680 I inventoried that they, during the last fire drill nothing 391 00:19:11.720 --> 00:19:15.000 but old folding chairs in the commemorative clock. Inside the crate, 392 00:19:15.039 --> 00:19:17.759 aside from the sculpture was an envelope stuffed with pamphlets 393 00:19:17.880 --> 00:19:20.559 library in the city's next century. They read dates running 394 00:19:20.599 --> 00:19:23.680 from twenty twenty three to twenty seventy three. These limb 395 00:19:23.680 --> 00:19:26.400 booklets were filled with lists of speculative stuff, rosters including 396 00:19:26.400 --> 00:19:29.880 all of us, with retirement dates and variously optimistic career highlights, 397 00:19:30.039 --> 00:19:34.079 ven descriptions, notes on planned renovations, even tentative partnerships with 398 00:19:34.200 --> 00:19:38.880 organizations not yet founded. Their predictions teetered between plausible and uncanny, 399 00:19:39.000 --> 00:19:42.319 sometimes aligning perfectly with projects that, to my knowledge, had 400 00:19:42.359 --> 00:19:46.599 never progressed beyond wishful thinking. Artifacts began to multiply a 401 00:19:46.599 --> 00:19:49.519