SeaHeart

I am so ecstatic, delighted and just over-the-moon joyful to announce that my short story, "The Witch Sea," won the first Kissed by Venus "New Voices" short story competition!!!!!!!!!! It will be in the February issue of Kissed by Venus, coming soon. :D :D :D

I'm so happy, and so grateful, and so, so...SO...

I FEEL LIKE THIS:

I grew up at the library. I was homeschooled and pretty sick as a kid, so activities out in the "real world" were few and far between, but the Holy Grail of the week was our Wednesday night library visits. They were immovable. They always happened, a sort of uncompromising rock to my growing-up years. Even now, if I'm troubled about anything, a trip to the library is absolute balm for my soul. I'll go in, inhale that all-too-familiar scent of books and stacks and paper and ink and stories, stories, stories, and I'm at peace.

I know I've talked before about how much the library means to me, how it's my safe haven, my sanctuary. It's such a regular part of my day-to-day life, even now, all grown. No longer "needing" the library, I need it just the same. I'm there a few times a week, oftentimes there every day, writing my stories or wandering the shelves, waiting for something to speak to me (how many times have I wandered through the non-fiction section to get a story idea pouncing on me!), picking up books I've ordered. I have two library cards to two separate, gigantic systems in New York state (living in one county and working in another FINALLY had its advantages), can pretty much find any book I want/need, sometimes for twenty-five cents a hold, sometimes for free (it depends on the system!). But, regardless, I can find it. It's like a free super power.

I know all of the librarians' names, the names of their pets (and how many they have), who their favorite authors are, what they like to read, and they know all of mine (one time, a favorite librarian and I talked for half an hour about cat NAMES. I was trying to buy a book from a book sale at the time. By the end of the discussion she just handed it to me and said it was a gift from the cat gods. :P The moral of the story: Nice people + conversations about cats = FREE BOOKS). They're like...the gods of literature. NEVER have I met a librarian I didn't love, ever since the first one long, long ago who put a Pratchett novel in a twelve year old girl's hands and said: "I think you'll love this, Sarah." <3 <3 <3

This whole post is brought to you today by the simple fact that I went to to the library this afternoon. No big thing--I was picking up the audio book of Terrier by Tamora Pierce, because I wanted to hear it performed (I'm re-reading all of my favorite Pierce novels right now for the ELVENTY BILLIONTH TIME. I don't know why I'm even bothering reading them, I still have most of the Immortals Quartet MEMORIZED.). I walk in, and I'm met with huge smiles and delighted conversation, and I realized as I was walking along the stacks, fingers brushing the row of books, that the library is, in many ways, Home for me. Arguably, nowhere else in the world is Story so important, so cherished, so talked about or so loved.

I'm so grateful that we have these bastions, these sanctuaries, these Homes.

I know I'm not the only little girl built on stories who grew up to be a Woman built on Stories because of libraries.