Not My Neighborhood

When Caroline was in kindergarten, she (and we) were asked to participate in the Early Childhood Longitudinal Study.  This study, sponsored by the U.S. Department of Education, followed a group of kindergartners from the class of 1998-1999 through 8th grade.  Study staff met with Caroline several times at school and they probably got input from her teachers as well (although I don't remember that for sure).  What I do remember were the long telephone interviews, asking about who was in the household and who took care of her.  There were questions over the years about how many children's books we had in the house.  As all three kids got older, there were more and more, and I remember one interviewer seemed incredulous in one of the later interviews when I estimated it at 2,000.  That probably was a low number, in retrospect, given how many boxes and bags full of books we've given away to pretty much anyone we could get to take them over the years.  We've given some to neighbors and boxes and boxes of them have gone to Morningside Elementary.  Some have gone to one of the green Better World Books bins around town.

One day last week someone on Noble Drive posted a note on the Morningside-Lenox Park email list requesting book donations for an elementary school in West Atlanta.  Last year the PTA at that school had sponsored a reading event and there was lots of interest from the students; in the course of this, it became apparent that there was a big unmet need in many children's homes for books.  So someone in my neighborhood sent out an email, asking us all to check our bookshelves, and so Iain and I did that on Saturday.    

I delivered the books on Sunday.  That overfilled box in the front are the books that I brought, but clearly we weren't the only family with books to donate.  I'm glad there was such a good response to this very worthwhile effort.

On the way home I was thinking about all the things we do with books that we're through with -- pretty much anything but throw them away (although I've done that too).  And then I drove past the Little Free Library that one of our neighbors has placed between the sidewalk and the curb in front of their house at Cumberland and Reeder.  We've left books there, too, as well as in the one on North Pelham.  Of course a Little Free Library is no substitute for a public library, but it's not intended to be; it's a way to pass along a book you don't want to keep to a neighbor who would enjoy it -- which certainly is a good thing to do.

Except in Leawood, Kansas, where a family had built a Little Free Library in their front yard, and then were informed by the city that the structure was in violation of a city ordinance prohibiting structures in front yards.  (I can only assume that bird houses are prohibited as well.)  According to the city, there had been complaints from neighbors.  One can only wonder what kind of neighborhood results in complaints like these, which blogger Scott Doyon cited from news reports. 

"Why do we pay taxes for libraries and have those boxes on our streets? In a blighted area? Sure, put them everywhere. We’re not a poor area. We don’t need them."

"First, there was just a library. Then, a bench was placed next to it. I think people were concerned there would be more and more stuff at their front yard."

The Kansas City Star editorial got it just right. "Neighbors who might be worried about them should wander over and borrow a book."

Read more here: http://www.kansascity.com/opinion/editorials/article590071.html#storylink=cpy

Last week the Leawood City Council unanimously approved a temporary exemption from the ordinance for Little Free Libraries.  So the Collins family's little library is legal in Leawood until October 20.  I'm not sure what happens then.

Thankfully, that's not my neighborhood.  Need something to read?  Lots of books to choose from, just around the corner.  And when you're done with it, you can pass it along to another neighbor.

Something to Read

Iain is working on breaking in his new hiking boots, so this morning we headed off to Herbert Taylor Park.  He spotted it before I did, as we were walking down Cumberland toward North Highland, the Little Free Library at the intersection of Cumberland and Reeder.

Although I knew that there were some of these in the Atlanta area, this is the first one I'd seen, and it was a real treat to find it just a couple blocks from home.  Pop-up libraries are one of the ways people have re-purposed tiny bits of public space to better support neighborhoods and communities.  I don't know the story for how this particular pop-up library came to be in my neighborhood, but I was delighted to find it here.  

There are the books we keep (we have too many of those, in our house) and the books we read and then pass on to someone else or donate to Better World Books; we should go to the public library, but we don't, because it's too far to walk and it's not open on Sunday and book-buying is something we do for fun.  This morning I did look at the books in the box with the glass door and I didn't see anything I wanted to add to my already-too-tall pile of books I want to read.  But last weekend Iain cleaned out the large bookcase in his bedroom and right now we have two large boxes of books in our foyer, waiting to be passed on to someone with younger children.  So when we got back from our walk, I picked out a few and walked them up the street to add them to the collection.  

And the next time I'm walking by, I'll check again.  

The Dead Bird

When my children were younger, I read to them, a lot. Since I was doing the reading as well as most of the book purchasing, I tried to find books that I liked. It's nice of course if the children liked them, too, but if I had to sit there and read it out loud, it might as well be something that appealed to me. So when I found a children's author that I liked, I bought all of their books that I could find. I might have said it was for my children, but that wasn't completely true; it was mostly for me.

One author that I liked a lot was Margaret Wise Brown, who wrote many wonderful books for children before her death in 1952 at age 42. I hadn't realized - until I read the Wikipedia article to find out when she died - that in addition to writing children's books she led a pretty interesting life. She is probably best known for Goodnight Moon, but she wrote many others, and at her death left behind a large number of manuscripts, at least some of which were published posthumously. One of her books - originally published in 1938 - tells the story of a group of children who find a dead bird.

The children were very sorry the bird was dead and could never fly again. But they were glad they had found it, because now they could dig a grave in the woods and bury it. They could have a funeral and sing to it the way grown-up people did when someone died.

So they take the bird into the woods and bury it, and sing a song to it, and they cry. They mark the bird's grave with a stone.

And every day, until they forgot, they went and sang to their little dead bird and put fresh flowers on his grave.




Recently, walking down the hallway to my office, I have often thought of this story. My office building has outer walls that are mostly windows. At the bottom of the windows on my floor is a narrow metal ledge, only 5 inches or so wide. One day a month or two ago I noticed on the ledge outside my office door the body of a small yellow-green bird, lying on its side; it was clearly dead. It was sad, seeing the body of this little female goldfinch right outside our window. I tried not to look, as I went in and out of my office.

Someone propped a book up against the window, so we wouldn't see it, every time we walked by.

Sometime after that, the dead bird was gone. I don't know what happened to it, but it was gone.

And now the book is now back on the shelf.