Holiday Dreams

I was sent this article by a friend of mine.

http://www.nytimes.com/2008/12/07/fashion/07clubs.html_r=2&em

She is actually the "leader" of the book group I belong to...if by leader you mean the girl who agrees to have a cozy and clean living room for the rest of us to lounge and chat and scream and laugh in once a month. The boys in the apartment make themselves scarce and us girls take over. It's a beautiful thing and after reading this article I realize how lucky we are to have a drama free club.

But what I really wanted to babble about is the idea brought up in the article that because of the economic problems we're all facing people are joining book clubs as a way to see friends and be entertained. I think this is absolutely true and I also think it's a really great thing! At my library I have certainly seen an up tick in activity and I have noticed that the list of books that we are sending to other libraries and holding for our patrons at our branch is slowly but surely getting longer. There have been a lot of articles talking about the resurgence of game nights, book clubs and potluck dinners. I still love that line from "the Princess Bride" when the grandfather says, "When I was a kid television was called BOOKS!" I just think it's kind of good for everyone to remember that for a long, long time families and friends used to spend time together actually being together! They read books around the fire or just told stories or danced all in their own homes. I hope that we can get back to that a little bit. To help that I think that libraries can really become a place for these groups to start up, meet up and hopefully people will remember how important libraries are in hard times. Maybe someone will say, "Hey! While we're bailing out the banks and the car makers, maybe we should throw some money at the public libraries!" I know it's kind of a long shot, but hey, a girl can dream.

I am happy to see that people aren't grousing about not having enough money for a giant holiday blow-outs this year but rather are happy to have the holidays go back to what they're really about...friends and family, love and togetherness.

I hope everyone has a good holiday season.
Cheers!
-the bookish bluestocking