family is where you find it

I hadn't expected to be back in Elyria again so soon, but when I read in the online Chronicle that my friend Linda's husband had passed away, I knew I would attend the memorial service. I wanted to see Linda and tell her how sorry I was, but I also wanted to see the library ladies, whom I knew would all be there. Linda works at the library where I worked for eleven years, and one thing I know about working there is that the staff takes care of its own.

I left the house mid-morning on Saturday, and an hour later I was turning into the parking lot of the church across the street from the library. I was barely inside the church door when I ran into Jenni and Maggie and Joanne. There were hugs all around, and as we walked down the hallway together our first questions were about each other's kids and where they were and what they were doing.

As we waited in line to sign the guest book (is that the correct term?) I saw more familiar faces up ahead. There were Mary and Terri and Barb and Lisa standing to one side. I received hugs straight down the line from all of them, and although I knew it was a solemn occasion, I felt a huge grin on my face from the pleasure of seeing them again. There was another quick round of "how are the kids?" before we turned to enter the sanctuary. I saw Brenda and Marianne and Janet there, as well, before we sat down.

I found myself seated between Jenni and Mary, who is so tender-hearted that she had her pack of tissues open on her lap before I even took my coat off. Mary is Irish, as was my friend's late husband, and as the organist played "Oh, Danny Boy" and "When Irish Eyes are Smilin", Mary's eyes welled over. I knew she had lost her mother within the last six months, and I could only imagine how difficult the day was for her. She was there anyway, though. For Linda.

Sitting at the memorial service surrounded by my friends, I was reminded of another service we attended together - could it be ten years ago now? - when Ava died. Terri's bright, beautiful daughter, who attended law school in Akron, had been sick most of her life. You wouldn't know it to look at her; she looked vibrant and healthy and full of life. She was my kids' babysitter for the years that they needed one. Their most vivid memory of her, I think, is that they always watched Court TV together, and that Ava always knew she wanted to be a lawyer. She was working towards that goal when her final illness caught up with her.

Seeing Linda enter the sanctuary with her daughters and their families brought home to me how devastating the loss of her husband was. My heart ached for her. I could only hope that the crowded memorial service would begin a healing process that I knew would take a long time. As the organist played "Amazing Grace" at the end of the service, even tough little Jenni broke down, and I handed Mary's tissue pack to her so she could wipe her eyes.

As we filed out, I saw Gina sitting in the back pew. I knew then that I had unconsciously been looking for her all morning, as I had known she would be there for Linda, as well. In fact, I could have written out a list beforehand of the women I anticipated seeing on that cold February morning, and I know I would have listed everyone I saw. We shared our joys and sorrows when we worked together, and we were sharing them still. That's what family does.

libraries (day three)

Yesterday's list was not meant to be an exhaustive one of all the libraries I have ever been in, of course. I have been in most of the public libraries in Lorain County at one time or another, for example, and I remember that Ben, Julie and I went to a branch library somewhere in Columbus one time when Tom was participating in some sort of academic competition. (Help me out here, guys. I don't think it was Academic Challenge - some sort of math competition, maybe?) I remember my dad taking us into the Carnegie Library in Oberlin once when we were kids, and being quite awed by it.

Of course, there are the libraries I have tried to visit, but found them closed. Ben and I stopped several times as we drove through Wellington to check out the lovely little Herrick Memorial Library, but it was never open when we were there. Julie and I found the Reed Memorial Library in Ravenna not yet open at 10:00 a.m. on a weekday morning, and decided it wasn't, perhaps, the library for us. I think we tried to visit the Bowling Green Public Library one weekend when we were there, as well. And we did wait in the parking lot of the Athens Public Library while Julie went in to pick up her Phi Beta Kappa cord right before commencement, but I don't really think that counts.

As Julie pointed out in her comment, there are the university libraries I have visited. Our landmark library at KSU, of course, and the library at LCCC, to begin with. I have been in the libraries at BGSU, OU, and the U of D, and, also, it occurs to me, the Mudd Resource Center at Oberlin College. I may well have gone into the library at University of Chicago with my brother, but, alas, that is too long ago for me to remember now.

And, you know, I want to say that I feel guilty that I have damned the Elyria Public Library with faint praise in my earlier posts. It is a fine little library, and what makes it that way is its collection of books, of course - and everything else a library has to have nowadays. But equally important is the library staff. Some of the women on that staff have made it their life's work to serve at that library, and they have done a damn fine job. I mentioned the wonderful children's librarians who enriched my kids' lives in an earlier comment, but I also want to recognize the outstanding reference staff of Rose Burton and Eve Major and Marianne Mahl. And I can't forget Terri Miller, who has been ably running the circ desk all these years. If each of these women has not yet reached twenty years at the library - and I know some of them have passed that milestone - they are real close. They are just as crucial to the library as the bricks and posts of the building and the books that are housed there.

I thank you for your time. *steps down off soap box*