WEBVTT 1 00:00:05.000 --> 00:00:07.599 For over forty years, I've said that libraries are defined 2 00:00:07.639 --> 00:00:11.640 by what Goesa noticed. Loose book plates, side doors that 3 00:00:11.759 --> 00:00:15.119 never quite close, faint dust hang at eight in the morning, 4 00:00:15.160 --> 00:00:17.760 gunned by ten. Today, as I set out the at 5 00:00:17.760 --> 00:00:20.120 milkokies had baked snug in their rounding for the children's 6 00:00:20.160 --> 00:00:22.239 reading hour. I gave the lobbies elevator one of my 7 00:00:22.320 --> 00:00:27.000 usual glances, old habit, nothing more. But today I lingered 8 00:00:27.719 --> 00:00:30.000 the panel below the frosted dot deco sign was softly 9 00:00:30.039 --> 00:00:32.560 a lie, each round button glowing ivory. One theory in 10 00:00:32.600 --> 00:00:36.759 that skeletal vertical row, out of place. The library building 11 00:00:36.840 --> 00:00:39.840 is and always has been, three stories tall, stately in 12 00:00:39.880 --> 00:00:43.920 red brick, dignified but sensibly a grand, manageable worn Yet 13 00:00:43.960 --> 00:00:47.240 here eight flours as plainly as you please. Topwost button 14 00:00:47.280 --> 00:00:49.439 must softly blinking the way that uplight does if you 15 00:00:49.520 --> 00:00:51.840 call the car from a different level. But the only 16 00:00:51.880 --> 00:00:54.240 people here at quarter to nine librarians rolling their book 17 00:00:54.240 --> 00:00:56.159 cut and a damp ground student waiting by the public 18 00:00:56.200 --> 00:00:58.960 computers had all come in with me. Nobody to summon 19 00:00:58.960 --> 00:01:02.439 a upper floor elevator, No possible weighted he weighing above. 20 00:01:03.079 --> 00:01:06.239 I've never seen anyone step from those half floors. Never 21 00:01:06.280 --> 00:01:09.159 once in years. I always assumed it was an old 22 00:01:09.159 --> 00:01:11.480 control panel or relic left from some plan that never 23 00:01:11.560 --> 00:01:14.239 reached brick and mortar. For all I know, it's out 24 00:01:14.239 --> 00:01:16.239 of order. The sort of fixed remained, and as quietly 25 00:01:16.280 --> 00:01:19.519 removed when budget's allow. Still, the peculiar little blip of 26 00:01:19.519 --> 00:01:22.719 the date button insisted itself, pulsing as if expecting. I 27 00:01:22.760 --> 00:01:25.359 jiggled my key ring and smiled, telling myself I'd mention 28 00:01:25.400 --> 00:01:27.159 it to Ellen lay To. Ellen has been captain and 29 00:01:27.239 --> 00:01:29.760 heart of this library for a decade. I balanced my 30 00:01:29.760 --> 00:01:33.359 cookie tin press two as usual, weighted the doors, gave 31 00:01:33.359 --> 00:01:37.640 a sigh, and opened in. I went a pause, and 32 00:01:37.920 --> 00:01:41.280 for just a breath an uncanny sensation the elevator gave 33 00:01:41.319 --> 00:01:44.040 a gentle, unfamiliating, not quite the mundane not if I knew, 34 00:01:44.079 --> 00:01:47.480 but a slightly higher rounder note. The interior light flickered 35 00:01:47.519 --> 00:01:49.680 once gold. Glancing over the shift of my shoe on 36 00:01:49.680 --> 00:01:52.959 the linoleum, I noticed a hesitance between the floors, as 37 00:01:52.959 --> 00:01:55.280 though the car were negotiating with itself how best to proceed. 38 00:01:55.879 --> 00:01:57.840 The paws lasted a heart beat or two longer than 39 00:01:57.879 --> 00:01:59.439 what I grew and to expect enough time for an 40 00:01:59.480 --> 00:02:01.519 idle foot, but perhaps I'd just woken up a little 41 00:02:01.519 --> 00:02:04.319 slow to day. When the doors opened, I stepped into 42 00:02:04.359 --> 00:02:06.560 the children's way, sunny as ever, but with a faint, 43 00:02:06.640 --> 00:02:09.400 persistent echo in my awareness, as if I'd almost caught 44 00:02:09.439 --> 00:02:11.759 a whiff of something out of joint. I sat at 45 00:02:11.759 --> 00:02:14.319 the cookies, greeted the first cluster of children, and did 46 00:02:14.319 --> 00:02:16.319 my best to shake the sensation. At something as trivial 47 00:02:16.360 --> 00:02:20.080 as an elevator could be inconsistent. Of course, I told myself, 48 00:02:20.080 --> 00:02:21.879 you were just thinking like a tired woman, hunting for 49 00:02:21.919 --> 00:02:24.120 patterns where none are meant to be. It would have 50 00:02:24.199 --> 00:02:26.919 been best, perhaps to leave it at that, But curiosity, 51 00:02:26.960 --> 00:02:29.360 once lit, even faintly, tends not to burn out quickly. 52 00:02:29.919 --> 00:02:32.680 I still remember the day, decades ago when I first 53 00:02:32.800 --> 00:02:36.120 visited the Sableport Public Library as a young teacher. It 54 00:02:36.159 --> 00:02:38.280 stood then as it does now, at the gentle bend 55 00:02:38.319 --> 00:02:40.159 of Volo and Shine, a block from the city's hall 56 00:02:40.280 --> 00:02:43.159 ferry basin. The library was all red brick, grin during 57 00:02:43.199 --> 00:02:45.639 deck of flourish as none of your grandiose marble, just 58 00:02:45.680 --> 00:02:49.159 careful stonework and neat little medallions. Above the doors. Three 59 00:02:49.159 --> 00:02:52.000 stories tall and reassuring, with four square bays visible from 60 00:02:52.039 --> 00:02:55.039 the street and squat arched windows. Most people who grew 61 00:02:55.080 --> 00:02:57.719 up here describe it as endlessly workable, like someone built 62 00:02:57.719 --> 00:02:59.479 a house from a child's drawing of a mazed summit. 63 00:02:59.520 --> 00:03:03.479 Rottenness here shadowed history corners there, there's no mistaking its ache. 64 00:03:03.560 --> 00:03:06.000 The Aratza floors bear the marks of generations of running 65 00:03:06.039 --> 00:03:09.120 shoes and careful canes. The air always hands faintly of 66 00:03:09.199 --> 00:03:12.280 lemon oil, and the recent presence of raincoats. My old 67 00:03:12.319 --> 00:03:16.039 friend Ellen, the head librarian, presides with gentle authority. Allen 68 00:03:16.120 --> 00:03:18.159 seems to know in advance which patron is about to 69 00:03:18.199 --> 00:03:20.599 lose their library card and which child requires just this 70 00:03:20.800 --> 00:03:23.800 very minute Effects of Life paperback disguised in a fantasy cover. 71 00:03:24.520 --> 00:03:26.599 Her desk is a shifting sea of check out slips 72 00:03:26.599 --> 00:03:29.759 and color coded notes from kindergarten teachers. She makes the 73 00:03:29.840 --> 00:03:32.039 rounds with quite jokes and an endless supply of safety 74 00:03:32.039 --> 00:03:34.840 pins for broken line notes to the town. She is 75 00:03:34.879 --> 00:03:37.719 both confidante and law keeper. A core staff are a 76 00:03:37.759 --> 00:03:40.719 shifting blend of old Nue Ruth with whom I taught 77 00:03:40.719 --> 00:03:44.000 summer reading a lifetime ago, knows the heritage room inside out. 78 00:03:44.680 --> 00:03:47.080 She's there nearly every morning, now, moving a bit more 79 00:03:47.120 --> 00:03:50.520 slowly but with a diminished energy, shepherding neophyte volunteers through 80 00:03:50.560 --> 00:03:53.599 the art of careful shelving. The younger librarians, such as 81 00:03:53.639 --> 00:03:57.400 bright and opinionated Tasher, have ideas about digitization, metadata, seamless 82 00:03:57.400 --> 00:04:00.680 online access. They favor slick tublets so for no cards, 83 00:04:00.759 --> 00:04:03.120 talk of a cold migration, and joke about their analog 84 00:04:03.199 --> 00:04:06.960 elders with affectionate exasperation. Mostly the regular croat is as 85 00:04:07.039 --> 00:04:09.199 varied as a city bus on a drizzly day, sharp eyed, 86 00:04:09.280 --> 00:04:12.560 undergrudguates chasing sources for their almost completed the seas aldermen 87 00:04:12.599 --> 00:04:14.800 in cuffed overalls who come for the daily crosswood and 88 00:04:14.800 --> 00:04:18.000 warm radiance, Mothers with strollers, night shift nurses looking for 89 00:04:18.079 --> 00:04:20.839 gentle mysteries. Retirees who want little more than a good 90 00:04:20.839 --> 00:04:24.279 conversation and an excuse to reminisce my duties steer me 91 00:04:24.360 --> 00:04:26.759 between the mundane and the alive reading hour with children 92 00:04:26.800 --> 00:04:30.000 helping ruth A stock biographies along the Western stacks, accepting 93 00:04:30.000 --> 00:04:33.439 oatmeal cookies and grateful exchanges for gossip. I've always leaned 94 00:04:33.439 --> 00:04:35.720 into routine, into detail, not out of fussness, but because 95 00:04:35.720 --> 00:04:39.439 small puzzles delight me. Sparting which shelf locks its favorite doggear, 96 00:04:39.519 --> 00:04:43.079 detective deciphering which curious mark in the circulation log belongs 97 00:04:43.079 --> 00:04:45.000 to Ruth orde Ellen or some bold student worker in 98 00:04:45.040 --> 00:04:47.399 the dub days of July. I think of my work 99 00:04:47.480 --> 00:04:50.160 less as volunteering than as embracing an ongoing invitation to 100 00:04:50.160 --> 00:04:53.160 be a part of the city's interior hum Recently, Ellen 101 00:04:53.199 --> 00:04:56.120 invited me to help digitize old checkout and circulation records. 102 00:04:56.720 --> 00:04:59.000 You are the only one left who can reach Shirley's handwriting, 103 00:04:59.079 --> 00:05:01.319 she joked, tapping a crate of ledges from the seventies. 104 00:05:01.360 --> 00:05:03.959 I set myself to the task weekday. Afternoons classes proached 105 00:05:03.959 --> 00:05:06.360 to halfredwne my nose tea cooling beside a slow computer 106 00:05:06.439 --> 00:05:09.040 that whirs and clicks. It's meticulous and delicious work. Not 107 00:05:09.120 --> 00:05:12.120 everyone would notice or care that Miss Johnstone in nineteen 108 00:05:12.160 --> 00:05:14.079 eighty two checked out The Box of Children two weeks 109 00:05:14.079 --> 00:05:16.639 after she claimed to have finished it. But I cherished 110 00:05:16.639 --> 00:05:19.480 these soft oddities, the fingerprints of lives that run alongside 111 00:05:19.519 --> 00:05:22.920 the books. The building itself, from basement to bright children's 112 00:05:22.959 --> 00:05:26.560 rottenda has always carried whispers, rumors of forgotten attics, secret 113 00:05:26.600 --> 00:05:29.240 stare was sealed during some long ago renovation, rooms that 114 00:05:29.399 --> 00:05:33.160 used to be something else in sometimes probably neverwhere As 115 00:05:33.160 --> 00:05:36.319 a girl, these tales flavored the library's consensus reality, but 116 00:05:36.399 --> 00:05:38.560 held no greater meaning for me than the innovations of 117 00:05:38.639 --> 00:05:42.480 Nancy Drew. Walls, after all, are what they appear. These 118 00:05:42.560 --> 00:05:45.000 last years, wrapped in the familiar textures of retirement and 119 00:05:45.079 --> 00:05:47.600 hurried yet alive to the unnoticed, I find myself unable 120 00:05:47.639 --> 00:05:50.680 to let tiny oddities slip by a misfile v recor, 121 00:05:50.920 --> 00:05:53.040 a shelf whose books never collect dusts, a door that 122 00:05:53.079 --> 00:05:56.399 sticks only on Tuesdays. It's a comfort to feel, perhaps 123 00:05:56.560 --> 00:05:59.480 that summer nottic sense, acquired three years of scaffolding young minds, 124 00:05:59.519 --> 00:06:02.240 has comforts that no small detail can truly hide forever. 125 00:06:03.000 --> 00:06:04.879 I was reminded of all this as I double checked 126 00:06:04.879 --> 00:06:07.279 the day's record digitization, finding a gap as to cut 127 00:06:07.319 --> 00:06:09.959 up poles of missing entries from nineteen seventy nine, just 128 00:06:09.959 --> 00:06:12.079 to hint out of rhythm with the usual near perfect 129 00:06:12.079 --> 00:06:14.920 march of checkouts. It's the sort of thing that, if 130 00:06:14.920 --> 00:06:18.079 you ask management, belongs to misprints and spilled coffee. But 131 00:06:18.120 --> 00:06:20.600 there was that elevator panel again with its ape buttons, 132 00:06:20.639 --> 00:06:23.319 and my fingers tinkled a little around their edges, remembering 133 00:06:23.319 --> 00:06:26.720 the peculiar too hiding. It took until late Thursday afternoon, 134 00:06:26.720 --> 00:06:28.959 while after story hour and the Daily but caught shuffle 135 00:06:29.040 --> 00:06:31.600 Before I was finally caught in the contradiction that wouldn't resolve. 136 00:06:32.199 --> 00:06:34.600 Allen handed me about a beeje envelope marked ill and 137 00:06:34.639 --> 00:06:36.800 asked me to bring it upstairs for Susan to process. 138 00:06:37.480 --> 00:06:40.839 Susan handles our interlibrary loans from the third floor reading rottenda, 139 00:06:41.000 --> 00:06:43.040 a honey lit room I had offered its glass panels 140 00:06:43.040 --> 00:06:46.439 and eternal geraniums. The envelope felt light, the kind of 141 00:06:46.439 --> 00:06:49.800 task you do an autopilot alone. For once by the elevator, 142 00:06:49.839 --> 00:06:52.439 I gazed at the lit panel. The truth is I 143 00:06:52.519 --> 00:06:54.759 was feeling quietly mischiefs that whom I can only blame. 144 00:06:54.800 --> 00:06:57.120 On too many evenings spent trading lodged puzzles with my 145 00:06:57.240 --> 00:07:00.399 late husband, with nobody behind to chivvy meal along. I 146 00:07:00.439 --> 00:07:04.839 pressed for the elevator kahand shivered faintly. Paul's one long instant, 147 00:07:04.839 --> 00:07:08.000 as though it needed to deliberate the request then with 148 00:07:08.040 --> 00:07:10.839 a low fist from its hidden workings, it rose a 149 00:07:10.839 --> 00:07:14.800 perfectly ordinary ride in retrospect. Doors parted before me, and 150 00:07:14.839 --> 00:07:17.480 I expected to see the familiar Southern Bay sunlight slanting 151 00:07:17.480 --> 00:07:20.759 across the cheerful sprawl of children's chapters and beanbecks. But 152 00:07:20.839 --> 00:07:23.680 I stepped and steed into a long, nearly silent reading room, 153 00:07:23.720 --> 00:07:27.000 lined on both sides by magazine racks and batted institutional tables. 154 00:07:27.639 --> 00:07:30.199 Institutional was the only word for it. Linoleum squares and 155 00:07:30.240 --> 00:07:33.720 drapeak green, thin fluorescent strips overhead furnishings mid century in 156 00:07:33.759 --> 00:07:36.240 a stylight only glimpsed in grainy school board photos from 157 00:07:36.279 --> 00:07:39.959 the nineteen sixties. The air was faintly musty, with flowery 158 00:07:40.000 --> 00:07:43.399 afternoon light settling in funny angles through three very narrow windows. 159 00:07:44.040 --> 00:07:45.839 I caught a soft bus from a wall mounted clock 160 00:07:45.839 --> 00:07:49.240 two full hours behind, stubbornly fixed at two seventeen. The 161 00:07:49.279 --> 00:07:52.399 reading matter was oddest of all racks full, but none 162 00:07:52.399 --> 00:07:55.920 of the slick current Affairs journals were modern glosses. Instead, 163 00:07:56.199 --> 00:07:59.199 yellowed issues of magazines carrying names I'd never seen tiedward 164 00:07:59.199 --> 00:08:01.920 to Progress, The Day River Pharmacist, a stock of civil 165 00:08:01.920 --> 00:08:05.680 defense monthly. There were regional magazines abandoning titles that referenced 166 00:08:05.720 --> 00:08:08.920 obscure local seasons, the sable Port Winter, Bay and Bank Reviewed, 167 00:08:08.959 --> 00:08:12.279 along with Faded Digest, recounting decades of racane small scale events. 168 00:08:13.000 --> 00:08:15.199 I reached for one, the Damn River Chronicle, dated August 169 00:08:15.279 --> 00:08:18.480 nineteen sixty four. On the cover a sebief photograph of 170 00:08:18.480 --> 00:08:22.079 city blocks, water lapping up curb height headline those who 171 00:08:22.160 --> 00:08:25.560 stayed remembering the nineteen fifty nine sable Port flood. Next 172 00:08:25.560 --> 00:08:28.160 table over, a patron sat with his elbows pressed precisely 173 00:08:28.160 --> 00:08:30.079 to the table top, paging through an issue of Bay 174 00:08:30.120 --> 00:08:32.600 and Bank Review. He must have been close to eighty. 175 00:08:33.240 --> 00:08:36.840 White hair smoothed neatly, glasses perched, fowed down his nose, 176 00:08:36.919 --> 00:08:39.279 a browann core trailing to the lapel of a gray windbreaker. 177 00:08:39.879 --> 00:08:42.440 He looked up as if startled to see anyone. I 178 00:08:42.480 --> 00:08:46.679 cleared my throat. Excuse me, I ventured, holding out the chronicle. 179 00:08:47.200 --> 00:08:49.080 Could I trouble you with the question about the flood? 180 00:08:49.159 --> 00:08:51.360 I wasn't where we'd ever Well, I've lived here my 181 00:08:51.440 --> 00:08:53.279 whole life, and I don't recall the city of a 182 00:08:53.320 --> 00:08:57.159 flooding like that. He smiled, almost kindly. Of course, we 183 00:08:57.200 --> 00:08:59.320 did not on the street. I remember Ferry Road and 184 00:08:59.360 --> 00:09:01.919 the market cut at. My father lost the cafe that year, 185 00:09:01.960 --> 00:09:04.480 he said, matter of fact, like a man discussing a 186 00:09:04.519 --> 00:09:07.879 football match. We grumbled about the football for a decade after. 187 00:09:08.159 --> 00:09:10.639 Eno didn't stop the high Tide in seventy three either. 188 00:09:11.200 --> 00:09:13.240 He seemed genuinely puzzled by my dad, so much so 189 00:09:13.360 --> 00:09:15.720 that I half wondered if I'd blanked out some local disaster. 190 00:09:16.320 --> 00:09:18.320 Were any books written about it? I helped with local 191 00:09:18.399 --> 00:09:21.240 history for years, and it's never come up. He shrugged. 192 00:09:21.879 --> 00:09:24.159 In newsprints all we had then tow library stashed it 193 00:09:24.240 --> 00:09:26.960 up here for when folks want to remember. He tapped 194 00:09:26.960 --> 00:09:30.279 the magazine, gently, thoughtful and not at all evasive. Nice 195 00:09:30.279 --> 00:09:32.080 to see a new face up here. Most people just 196 00:09:32.080 --> 00:09:34.639 look up their relatives in the list. I thanked him 197 00:09:34.720 --> 00:09:38.679 and excuse myself. The room, though utterly unfamiliar, didn't feel 198 00:09:38.720 --> 00:09:42.360 staged or anauthentic. If this were a historical exhibit, it 199 00:09:42.440 --> 00:09:44.840 was both ignored and an advertised the chronic failure of 200 00:09:44.840 --> 00:09:48.120 the library's own efforts at commemoration. I wandered to the stairs, 201 00:09:48.120 --> 00:09:51.480 determined to find my bearings. The stairwell culled down, tightly 202 00:09:51.679 --> 00:09:53.960 enclosed by walls that seemed abruptly newer than the reading 203 00:09:54.000 --> 00:09:56.679 room above. A fresh lick of paint. Posters about Overjufind's, 204 00:09:56.679 --> 00:09:59.720 taped at odd intervals. One flight down, the door opened 205 00:09:59.720 --> 00:10:02.519 onto the the second floor, reference and nonfiction cased in 206 00:10:02.519 --> 00:10:05.519 the brittle sunlight of the southwest windows. No sign of 207 00:10:05.559 --> 00:10:08.159 the extended mid century reading room, just the familiar scent 208 00:10:08.159 --> 00:10:10.840 of newly resheved dictionaries and a student drumming his fingers 209 00:10:10.840 --> 00:10:13.840 beside the encyclopedia. For the remainder of my shifts, more 210 00:10:13.879 --> 00:10:17.279 contradictions echoed in my mind. Perhaps I'd wandered into some 211 00:10:17.320 --> 00:10:19.720 themed corner for local nostalgia, a hold of a room 212 00:10:19.720 --> 00:10:23.320 from before the latest renovation, or perhaps an archaevil annex 213 00:10:23.559 --> 00:10:26.600 usually overlooked had adopted a little more institutional character than 214 00:10:26.639 --> 00:10:29.440 the rest. I'd simply taken the wrong flight of stairs. 215 00:10:29.440 --> 00:10:32.200 Loss and routine, but confusion lingered like a tickle on 216 00:10:32.240 --> 00:10:34.440 the back of my hand. There was no trace of 217 00:10:34.480 --> 00:10:37.200 any such room in the archive, building maps, no legend 218 00:10:37.240 --> 00:10:40.799 naming a mid century flood. My brain insisted on an explanation, 219 00:10:40.960 --> 00:10:43.399 as if organizing puzzle pieces that didn't quite belong in 220 00:10:43.440 --> 00:10:46.120 the same picture. That night, eating left of receip in 221 00:10:46.159 --> 00:10:48.679 my small kitchen, the elevators and Congruo's panel lingered in 222 00:10:48.720 --> 00:10:51.840 my mind, along with the blinking eight A trick of memory, 223 00:10:51.879 --> 00:10:54.799 I assured myself, But there was something within, a gentle 224 00:10:54.840 --> 00:10:57.559 fascination I hadn't felt since the class room days, when 225 00:10:57.559 --> 00:10:59.639 a child question appended an entire or less im plan 226 00:10:59.720 --> 00:11:04.000 before the lunch bell. Curiosity does not like to be ignored, nor, 227 00:11:04.039 --> 00:11:06.879 as it happened, did the library. The next day, Armed 228 00:11:06.879 --> 00:11:09.399 with my notebook, I decided to make a deliberate experiment. 229 00:11:10.039 --> 00:11:12.320 I arrived half an hour early, notebook in my bag, 230 00:11:12.360 --> 00:11:14.919 a new tin of cookies for the front desk. The 231 00:11:14.960 --> 00:11:17.519 elevator rated the panel as ever, bathed in a prudence 232 00:11:17.559 --> 00:11:20.799 of normalcy. I pressed for this time, noting the exact 233 00:11:20.840 --> 00:11:24.039 minute and the sound of the elevator's old, slightly wavering hum, 234 00:11:24.360 --> 00:11:26.919 just as before, a moment's stillness. Then a slight award 235 00:11:27.000 --> 00:11:29.879 lurch and ob bwobbling a foot orescent light overhead. The 236 00:11:29.919 --> 00:11:33.519 doors opened, but not onto the room I visited yesterday. Instead, 237 00:11:33.639 --> 00:11:35.799 I stepped out into a corridor with deep blue carpet, 238 00:11:35.840 --> 00:11:37.840 the plush short naps thought that picks up every bit 239 00:11:37.879 --> 00:11:40.519 of daylight and holds echoes at your feet. Lining the 240 00:11:40.519 --> 00:11:43.840 walls frame portraits of unfamiliar, flamboyantly dressed men and women, 241 00:11:43.919 --> 00:11:46.960 jackets with shining lapels, dresses bursting with sequins, the likes 242 00:11:46.960 --> 00:11:48.960 of which had seen only in the old musical theater 243 00:11:49.000 --> 00:11:52.440 Playbele's roof collects. The room beyond was a music archive, 244 00:11:52.600 --> 00:11:55.879 larger than even our own Grand four music collection. Spines 245 00:11:55.919 --> 00:11:58.360 glittered beneath the shell's glass, and a wall was lined 246 00:11:58.360 --> 00:12:00.960 with vinted sheet music catalog by hand on heavy doll 247 00:12:01.039 --> 00:12:03.879 gated cards. But these weren't the composers I taught to 248 00:12:03.919 --> 00:12:06.960 the children. No familiar Beethoven, bar or Rodgers and hammer 249 00:12:07.039 --> 00:12:11.159 sign Instead als Ronan's eight Symphony marked premiered nineteen thirty 250 00:12:11.159 --> 00:12:14.639 one sable Port Civic Call. I blinked. There was a 251 00:12:14.639 --> 00:12:17.360 whole section of tide Water suites by Alvahni and Bay 252 00:12:17.360 --> 00:12:20.080 Operata series attributed to names I'd never come across, and 253 00:12:20.240 --> 00:12:23.159 music appreciation or decades of helping children choose their school 254 00:12:23.240 --> 00:12:27.919 recital pieces. I leafed through one catalog. Alser Ronan pictured 255 00:12:27.919 --> 00:12:30.600 at a baby grand silver Haired, was credited with a 256 00:12:30.639 --> 00:12:33.720 dozen local performances and copious footnotes to city festivals. I 257 00:12:33.759 --> 00:12:36.279 never remembered happening in years when I was already living here. 258 00:12:36.960 --> 00:12:40.600 The photos were faded, but unmistakably real. Sheet music pages 259 00:12:40.639 --> 00:12:43.159 bore faint pencil markings and hands so familiar at her 260 00:12:43.159 --> 00:12:46.519 to teachers and mandations. Some notation made by a narrow 261 00:12:46.679 --> 00:12:49.759 determined child. I finched when I heard someone behind me. 262 00:12:50.480 --> 00:12:53.279 Tasha Leaves rolled to the elbows, carrying a stack of 263 00:12:53.279 --> 00:12:56.440 freshly rebound books for the third floor. But she said, 264 00:12:56.519 --> 00:12:59.240 a fraction too bright. Don't usually see you up here. 265 00:12:59.240 --> 00:13:01.240 The supply closets and a weird spot on this level 266 00:13:01.240 --> 00:13:04.919 won't help finding anything. Is this a new collection? I ask, 267 00:13:05.279 --> 00:13:09.960 careful to sound only lightly puzzled. She laughed this she 268 00:13:10.039 --> 00:13:13.120 swept her arm. That's the old music collection, been in 269 00:13:13.159 --> 00:13:15.879 storage forever. We keep meaning to move half this to archives. 270 00:13:16.000 --> 00:13:18.000 But Ruth likes the way its mouse. Plus the ard 271 00:13:18.120 --> 00:13:21.480 is a kick. I detected no hesitation, only good natured 272 00:13:21.519 --> 00:13:25.240 bewilderment at my ignorance. I've never seen it before, I admitted, 273 00:13:25.360 --> 00:13:28.240 watching her stack books indifferently beside a pair of yellowed playbiles. 274 00:13:28.919 --> 00:13:32.039 Oh well, she said, this building has more nooks than sense. 275 00:13:32.679 --> 00:13:35.519 On my next break, a cornered ellen, her reply was 276 00:13:35.600 --> 00:13:39.080 vintage librarian ambiguity. Bro There were all sorts of renovations, 277 00:13:39.279 --> 00:13:41.600 specially after that fire in the forties. They must have 278 00:13:41.639 --> 00:13:43.279 moved things here and there. I'd have to look up 279 00:13:43.320 --> 00:13:45.519 the records. But fours always shift a bid in these 280 00:13:45.519 --> 00:13:48.519 old places. She offered her gentle shrug, the kind that 281 00:13:48.559 --> 00:13:52.000 closes some doors and keeps others for later. I resolved 282 00:13:52.039 --> 00:13:55.960 that afternoon to check the official blueprints. The librarians Planning 283 00:13:55.960 --> 00:13:58.279 Office keeps files on everything from five drills to the 284 00:13:58.320 --> 00:14:02.440 nineteen eighty seven emergency plumbing ritrofit. The cities own napped, too, 285 00:14:02.519 --> 00:14:05.240 are freely available. Once I'd mustered the patients to negotiate 286 00:14:05.240 --> 00:14:08.799 the city website's labyrinth. None, however, listed more than three 287 00:14:08.840 --> 00:14:12.440 stories and abysment. There was some classic indication marks fatic 288 00:14:12.519 --> 00:14:15.080 unusable staff acts as stairwell, but never any sign of 289 00:14:15.120 --> 00:14:17.919 a fourth or higher floor. The floors, as far as 290 00:14:17.919 --> 00:14:21.639 City Hall was concerned, simply didn't exist. That evening, I 291 00:14:21.720 --> 00:14:24.080 ran into Ruth, exiting the parking lot hand full of 292 00:14:24.159 --> 00:14:27.279 children's books destined for a local shelter. I told her, 293 00:14:27.320 --> 00:14:29.639 in a muted side about the old music collection I'd 294 00:14:29.639 --> 00:14:33.720 found on flour for She squinted music collection. I think 295 00:14:33.720 --> 00:14:36.120 that was box and moved down to archives before the renovation. 296 00:14:36.320 --> 00:14:38.600 Or did you mean the old inventory room. Ruth's memory, 297 00:14:38.639 --> 00:14:42.120 for once did not provide this place, she chuckle. Sometimes 298 00:14:42.120 --> 00:14:44.720 I still get lost on my way to reference. By 299 00:14:44.759 --> 00:14:48.399 the following week, quiet obsession had seated itself. I began 300 00:14:48.480 --> 00:14:51.360 each shift with a new experiment, recording the elevator's behavior, 301 00:14:51.440 --> 00:14:53.360 noting not just which button I pressed, but the time, 302 00:14:53.399 --> 00:14:55.519 the direction of the journey, whether I was alone or 303 00:14:55.559 --> 00:14:58.200 with another. I tried a fifth floor and found yet 304 00:14:58.200 --> 00:15:01.320 another unfamiliar expanse of reading parlor with curved art decor divans, 305 00:15:01.679 --> 00:15:04.879 all upholstered in exuberant florals, brass lamps shining upon a 306 00:15:04.919 --> 00:15:07.200 wall of pulp thrillers. I had never heard of Crimson 307 00:15:07.200 --> 00:15:10.320 Tide mysteries from Mariner Press Lettle books with titles like 308 00:15:10.360 --> 00:15:13.039 The Sable Board, Iglar Robbery and Captain Sales's Final Case. 309 00:15:13.720 --> 00:15:17.000 I persuited Ash to ride with me. She gleefully pressed three, 310 00:15:17.039 --> 00:15:19.960 and we arrived in the familiar children's rotenda all honey 311 00:15:19.960 --> 00:15:22.240 and coloring books in the gentlest hint of Creon lax. 312 00:15:22.919 --> 00:15:25.399 But as I pressed her for details, her version diverged. 313 00:15:25.399 --> 00:15:27.639 Her third floor was the one with the genealogy lockers 314 00:15:27.639 --> 00:15:30.000 and all the microfilm, and notion that, if true, overlapt 315 00:15:30.039 --> 00:15:32.519 and evenly with my experience, which had never included more 316 00:15:32.559 --> 00:15:35.840 than the small alcove of city registers. The other's opinions 317 00:15:35.919 --> 00:15:39.679 ranged from mild amusement to unstowed practicality. One older volunteer 318 00:15:39.759 --> 00:15:42.279 insisted the mystery novels had always been on the fourth floor. 319 00:15:42.480 --> 00:15:45.000 Ejust had to take the back stairs, while another claimed 320 00:15:45.000 --> 00:15:47.279 the genealogy corner was in the basement before they moved 321 00:15:47.279 --> 00:15:50.639 the children's area upstairs. Tasher, for her part, said the 322 00:15:50.679 --> 00:15:53.600 library rearranges itself every few years, as if wanderings in 323 00:15:53.679 --> 00:15:55.720 layout were as regular as a fresh coat of paint. 324 00:15:56.440 --> 00:16:00.000 On slow afternoons, I leafed through circulation logs and city directors. 325 00:16:00.799 --> 00:16:03.799 Each source agreed in broad terms, three stories, one basement, 326 00:16:03.840 --> 00:16:07.080 a few minor renovations here and there, the nineteen fifties 327 00:16:07.120 --> 00:16:09.399 re roofing, an addition of fire exits in eight is 328 00:16:09.440 --> 00:16:12.639 nothing unadded up the flaws in the heritage room, pages 329 00:16:12.639 --> 00:16:15.679 of brittle newsprint, chronicle decades of mundane improvement, but never 330 00:16:16.360 --> 00:16:20.200 just never wholeso architectural magic. Yet the elevator continued to 331 00:16:20.200 --> 00:16:23.039 offer new oddities, and my own memories began to swim. 332 00:16:23.320 --> 00:16:25.600 I have long ago believed myself a reliable witness, not 333 00:16:25.679 --> 00:16:28.000 just for the children's stories, but the air and flow 334 00:16:28.039 --> 00:16:31.240 of the library's long history. Yet now, when pressed, I 335 00:16:31.279 --> 00:16:34.399 found my own recollections of hidden corners, odd stair walls, 336 00:16:34.480 --> 00:16:37.000 and childhood games in the libraries less traveled wings, both 337 00:16:37.039 --> 00:16:40.960 clearer and more suspect. Perhaps, I mused, this was the 338 00:16:40.960 --> 00:16:43.879 function of Ajor Gurgel, noticing of things that never quite fit, 339 00:16:44.080 --> 00:16:47.759 or perhaps never needed to. The break room conversations changed too, 340 00:16:48.440 --> 00:16:50.879 I'd started talking around rather than through the issue, testing 341 00:16:50.879 --> 00:16:53.919 the weight of Christians, noting how some staff remembered oudloffs 342 00:16:54.039 --> 00:16:56.600 now vanished, or aging near fiction back staircase that both 343 00:16:56.600 --> 00:16:59.120 did and did not exist, depending on whose version you heard. 344 00:17:00.080 --> 00:17:03.480 Rainy Tuesday, after a morning spent digitizing nineteen eighties checkouts 345 00:17:03.519 --> 00:17:05.599 and watching the storm blowing from the river, I finally 346 00:17:05.599 --> 00:17:09.279 found myself standing in the elevator alone again. I pressed 347 00:17:09.279 --> 00:17:12.359 floor six. The ride was longer a gentle, humming punctuary. 348 00:17:12.440 --> 00:17:15.759 By an unexpected, elegant chime, the doors opened onto yet 349 00:17:15.759 --> 00:17:18.799 another unfamiliar, self contained room, deep teal carpet, a warren 350 00:17:18.839 --> 00:17:21.359 of low book shows marked city science reading room, walls 351 00:17:21.359 --> 00:17:24.279 adorned with posters of sable Port and Vengeance, electric quarter meters, 352 00:17:24.319 --> 00:17:28.680 programmable beacons, first local microwave really nineteen seventy three. The 353 00:17:28.720 --> 00:17:32.119 spines again bore names strangely absent from city history. A 354 00:17:32.160 --> 00:17:35.480 sense of unreality hovered, yet the ordinary continued to assert itself. 355 00:17:36.039 --> 00:17:37.960 A woman in a blue sweater sat at the near end, 356 00:17:38.039 --> 00:17:41.279 reading quietly. She met my glance with the practiced nonchalance 357 00:17:41.319 --> 00:17:44.039 of any week to patron, Excuse me, I said, Do 358 00:17:44.119 --> 00:17:47.799 you come up here often? She looked over. Sometimes good 359 00:17:47.839 --> 00:17:51.480 for work? Nobody interrupts. She closed her book, revealing the 360 00:17:51.480 --> 00:17:54.559 title of Tides and Technologies of Sableport nineteen seventy two 361 00:17:54.559 --> 00:17:57.880 eighty one. The publisher, I never heard of Sassafras Press. 362 00:17:58.559 --> 00:18:01.359 The city had its own science reading room, I said, 363 00:18:01.440 --> 00:18:04.400 embarrassed at Hallettlin knew of my own town. Oh yes, 364 00:18:04.440 --> 00:18:06.720 she said, all the old records before the new archives. 365 00:18:06.759 --> 00:18:08.759 Hard to get to now unless you know the way, 366 00:18:09.319 --> 00:18:12.880 and that it seemed was that she returned to her book. 367 00:18:13.480 --> 00:18:16.079 I lingered, noting the gentle were of a microvolm reader, 368 00:18:16.200 --> 00:18:19.039 the sleant of artificial effusing through ude glass, the irreducible 369 00:18:19.079 --> 00:18:20.799 sense of being only half a step out of phase 370 00:18:20.839 --> 00:18:23.279 with what I understood sable Port and its library to 371 00:18:23.319 --> 00:18:26.119 be ak in the main lobby, the wolver set itself 372 00:18:26.119 --> 00:18:29.160 to normal prescillos, chasing each other with four alphabet blocks. 373 00:18:29.319 --> 00:18:32.079 Allen at the desk, fielding a call about overdue gardening books, 374 00:18:32.119 --> 00:18:34.440 the city's oldest retire sharing a muffled joke with a 375 00:18:34.440 --> 00:18:39.079 graduate student. But the contradiction would not recede official records, 376 00:18:39.079 --> 00:18:42.240 and my own senses were in arts staff. Memories were 377 00:18:42.240 --> 00:18:45.799 colleidoscopic in their differences. Each sojourn to a so called 378 00:18:45.799 --> 00:18:48.440 extra floor offered up not just new rooms or misplaced books, 379 00:18:48.519 --> 00:18:53.200 but entire subcollections, magazines, music scores, posters, scientific treatises, each 380 00:18:53.200 --> 00:18:56.000 from a specific period, each unknown to stand out city history, 381 00:18:56.079 --> 00:18:59.519 each impossibly complete in its own way. With every experiment, 382 00:18:59.559 --> 00:19:03.039 the boundary of the anomaly widened. I decided, one afternoon, 383 00:19:03.039 --> 00:19:05.720 reined in nobody much about to take a student's approach 384 00:19:06.440 --> 00:19:08.799 I drew up my own set of maps, sketching elevation 385 00:19:08.920 --> 00:19:12.359 after elevation as best I could recall entry lobby, children's rottenda, 386 00:19:12.440 --> 00:19:15.359 the third four alcove, the signs reading room, the music archive, 387 00:19:15.440 --> 00:19:19.000 the odd magazine mays. Each extra floor was distinct, never 388 00:19:19.039 --> 00:19:22.480 blending themes, always corresponding to a single, discrete era of 389 00:19:22.480 --> 00:19:26.160 the science, content and idiosyncratic history. Only a few items 390 00:19:26.240 --> 00:19:30.559 fire exits, stairwalls, a few posters overlapped. The collections themselves 391 00:19:30.559 --> 00:19:34.240 were entirely self contained. Sixties magazines and signs on one floor, 392 00:19:34.440 --> 00:19:37.440 flamboyant music publishing on another, of children's stories authored by 393 00:19:37.440 --> 00:19:40.200 writers I could not count for on a third. Determined 394 00:19:40.240 --> 00:19:43.240 to check my impressions, I laid these makeshift mats alongside 395 00:19:43.240 --> 00:19:46.519 the stunt blueprints from the city's records. The contradiction was 396 00:19:46.519 --> 00:19:49.519 now overwhelming. The blueprints showed three fours. My layots now 397 00:19:49.559 --> 00:19:52.200 extended to seven, each, featuring contents that were as real 398 00:19:52.240 --> 00:19:54.640 in a moment as the familiar lobby. Yet no were listed, 399 00:19:54.720 --> 00:19:57.400 no were visually apparent from the outside. No we coordinated 400 00:19:57.440 --> 00:20:00.920 specially or historically. I spent anan humming hour in the 401 00:20:00.920 --> 00:20:03.759