Spotting ‘types’ at the public library isn’t too tough

I spend a lot of time at the library down the street. It’s a nice facility, completed this past spring.

They let me work there all day, no questions asked. I used to work from home, back when I had a dog, cat and occasional person to look after. These days I’m on my own, and the house seems big and empty.

I’m not feeling sorry for myself here, really. I’ve gotten used to having the place to myself; it’s not so bad. But it does get a bit boring having nobody to talk with but the finch. Finches are notoriously dull conversationalists.

So I hang at the library.

Being there so much, I’ve started to develop a skill generally seen only in librarians: I can tell what sort of book a person is going to pick out just by looking at them. It’s true!

There are a few “types” anyone could figure out. The fat guy wearing a Batman T-shirt, Bermuda shorts and flip-flops; you just know he’ll head straight for the science fiction section. Likewise, the mousy, middle-aged woman dressed like a Mennonite will covertly browse the Harlequin romances for a while before picking out something featuring a bare-chested Fabio type on the jacket.

Like I said, those types are easy. Not all are. Teenage girls, for example, fall into several sub-types. There are the athletic girls, who check out biographies of other athletic girls. Teen hotties beeline for the magazine room, where they peruse recent issues of “Cosmo” or “Sassy,” depending on age. And Goth teens (there are still some of ‘em out there!) skulk up and down the stacks looking for anything from Anne Rice or whichever author has penned the latest popular vampire tome.

Teenage boys fall into similar sub-types.

Little old ladies are fond of mysteries, especially serials featuring a female protagonist. They regularly ask the librarian to suggest a book and are therefore favored by the women who work behind the counter. Librarians are just like the rest of us – they’re dying to share their opinions with someone willing to listen.

Little old men go in for historical epics. Wars, from Civil to Desert Storm, are popular fare with guys 65 and up. Biographies of Winston Churchill and Roosevelt are always on the library’s waiting list.

Guys wearing ties get books on either business or religion. Men in Carharts frequent the “how to” aisle. Ladies with reading glasses hanging around their necks on little gold chains go in for true-life stories about women who have overcome a) drug addiction, b) alcoholism, c) abusive parents, d) depression, or e) missed episodes of “Oprah.”

Young kids are the only “type” impossible to predict. They’re happy with pretty much anything. Every book is a wonder to them and they’re years away from falling into anything resembling a reading rut.

It’s hard not to envy them as they tear through the shelves, poring over novels, poetry, biographies, comics. Children are the only truly omnivorous readers.

But maybe it’s not too late for the rest of us to step outside our habits and read something we usually would not. I’ll start the ball rolling.

Let’s see, what’s Oprah recommending this week?

Missed a week? More “Reality Check” online at http://mtrealitycheck.blogspot.com or www.milive.com. E-mail Mike Taylor at mtaylor325@gmail.com.

On the lam from the long arm of the library

I read all the time. It hasn’t made me any smarter, but I do it anyway. It’s a compulsion.

If I have reading materials, I can sit for hours; without them, I fidget like a puppy about to pee on the carpet.

The reading materials in question don’t have to be great literature. In a pinch, I’m happy perusing the ingredients list from a box of cereal or bottle of shampoo, though neither of these holds my attention as well as, say, a Robert B. Parker novel.

I usually read two or three books at a time. Not simultaneously, but you know what I mean. At the moment, I’m reading a science fiction novel, a biography of Albert Einstein, and a history of witchcraft in Europe.

I’m a fast reader and by this time next week, I’ll have moved on to three (or more) other books.

I don’t want to come across as some sort of literati elitist here; I love television even more than I love reading—it demands less of me and is just as entertaining. If there was something good airing every time I switched on the set, I’d probably never read again. But most TV programming is garbage, so read I must.

Like any habit, the “need to read” creeps up on you. My first “grownup” book was a weathered copy of Robinson Crusoe I found in my parents’ attic when I was around 12 years old. I read it and loved it.

From there I moved on to H.G. Wells, Jules Verne, George Orwell. By the time I discovered Ray Bradbury, I was hopelessly hooked, a book junkie.

I spent more time at the library than I did at home, scrutinizing the stacks, selecting from the thousands of offerings just waiting to be absorbed by my young mind. The habit followed me into adulthood and the library became a permanent fixture in my life.

It was a relationship made in heaven, until about 10 year ago. I checked out several books from my local library just prior to being transferred by the newspaper I was writing for at the time to a city farther north. I no longer had time to visit my local library and instead began frequenting the one located in the city in which I was working.

Meanwhile, my local library books sat unread on a shelf in my office, forgotten among the hundreds of other books in there. Months passed, then years.

The library lady called, reminding me of my overdue books. Gotta remember to take ‘em back, I told myself, before forgetting all about it again.

Then the other day I was shoveling out my upstairs office, as I do every couple years, and I rediscovered the overdue books. Years overdue. Nearly a decade overdue.

I did the math. At 10-cents per day, per book, for ten years, I owed the library $1,095 and change.

If I returned the books, ‘fessed up and paid the fine, the library would be able to add a new wing. Maybe they would name it after me.

Despite fears of being severely beaten by the head librarian (I’m almost sure she could take me in a fair fight) I returned the overdue books. Turns out there’s a cap on library fines and I owed only $36, which saved me $1,059.

Since I long ago lost my old library card, they issued me a new one, no questions asked. I couldn’t believe how forgiving they were.

It’s been two weeks and I haven’t yet used my new card. But it’s only a matter of time. They have a copy of Robinson Crusoe there, and I’ve forgotten what happens to Friday.


More “Reality Check” online at http://mtrealitycheck.blogspot.com or www.milive.com. E-mail Mike Taylor at mtaylor325@gmail.com.