non-ode

I don’t think I’ll ever be able to express how enjoyable it truly is to spend a day in the stacks. Whatever may be going on in your life outside the safety of the library disappears when you enter though the large doors. There’s something about secluding oneself, up above the world and safe in the fortress that is any good library. You’re secure and comforted, for you know your place in the world, it is to sit and work, to be hyperproductive. The amount of work you would slowly get through working at home the entire day is streamlined into 3 or 4 hours of focused work. Things get accomplished, leaving you the entire evening to catch up on BBC shows.

It’s quiet, despite people moving through trying to find their spot. A communal bond forms among those of you gathered, when someone whispers if he or she can borrow a pen, you gracefully oblige. (I do at least, I was that girl on Saturday.) The sound of the wind whistles by the windows, magnified. It might be howling outside, but here it is safe, warm, and dry.

Time passes at a different rate, simultaneously both slower and faster. You can take all day to read a passage closely because you have all day, except the length of time that feels to be “all day” is more often than not 45 minutes to an hour.

You don’t even have to worry about being fashionable in the stacks. A sweater and a bun here are two of the most appropriate pieces of one’s attire, any other chic boots, glasses, scarves, etc. are just more festivity. (I truly believe that you are only as productive/smart as you look and feel that day.)

When the time does come to leave, you reward yourself with a pastry (preferably a pear puff) and pleasure reading because you’ve been so productive. You can relish the taste and enjoy your espresso in bliss, knowing you only have a little bit of online research left when you get home. (Goodness knows, you won’t trust yourself if you get the key to the wireless up here. If you do, the world of Facebook and Twitter will only bombard you, breaking your tranquility with banal cyber-socializing.)

That’s all I know guys. Sorry for the pretension, the last two texts I worked my way through were both 19th century romantics (DeQuincy and Poe look what you do to me!). True statement: I love the stacks (if you couldn’t tell by the ridiculous language above) & I’m off to eat a pear puff (it’s been a whole week).

xoxo & cheers, happy studying too (if applicable)
D


**NOTE: After this was written, I went to get said pear puff - they had none! Sad day; I had to suffer and eat a jam doughnut instead. Poo. :))