Sometimes I like to visit the public library and allow myself to browse around without any particular agenda. I like to wander around the stacks and trill my fingers along the spines of books as if the library itself were some enormous instrument. I let my attention focus at will. Little things are allowed to pop out. A word in a title. A bright green cloth binding. An unusually small book.

You can touch anything in the library. No one tries to sell you anything. Everything is free.

In the library, if you’re a book, and you have not been checked out in a very long time, they will put you away in compact storage. It is these books I like the most. Whenever I come across a book in storage, I feel proud that I actually need the book and have a reason for it to be retrieved.

Just about every book is now barcoded for check-out, but sometimes you will come across a book that still has its analog card inside. The older the due-date, the happier I am to have checked it out. If it has been decades since the book was last checked-out, I sometimes allow myself to think that the librarian might be impressed with my discovery.

There is something therapeutic about wandering the stacks. I can’t quite articulate what it might be. Maybe it’s that one feels as though there is a purpose without there ever really being a goal. It’s a sense of purpose without a sense of obligation.

Libraries are intrinsically cinematic. When you walk down the rows, the shift in perspective reminds me of a nice slow pan in a Max Ophuls film. Peeping through the shelves at other library patrons is a little voyeuristic, and a little romantic. The languidness with which library assistants replace books on the shelves makes me think of slow Japanese films.

When I was in tenth grade, I checked out twenty three books from the downtown public library. The books were research material for a paper that was actually enjoyable to research. I luxuriated in copying out the bibliographic material, and secretly relished the lengthy list of cited works at the end of my paper. Every single book was late in being returned. It took me almost two years to save up the money required to once again borrow books.

My favorite section to browse is not the fiction section. I like instructional manuals for things that I would never consider taking instructions in. I like reference books with black and white illustrations. I like small books that are held in large folders so they don’t get lost. I like looking through books backwards. I like when unexpected things fall out of a book as you are flipping through it. Like a grocery list, or an old dry leaf.

One time in the library there was a massive hail storm. The library had glass sky lights and the hail banged, bounced and ricocheted off the glass. No one seemed particularly impressed and continued with what they were doing. I watched the hail from the window on the third floor. Within minutes of the storm tapering off, all the hail on the street had melted and it was if it had never happened.

~Michael Neault