"Libraries raised me. I don’t believe in colleges and universities. I believe in libraries because most students don’t have any money. When I graduated from high school, it was during the Depression and we had no money. I couldn’t go to college, so I went to the library three days a week for 10 years."

— Ray Bradbury

Woke late this morning in a hot haze. Hot thanks to nearly midday sun outside the window that makes my bed the most delightful and most miserable spot in my apartment. Hazy thanks to life.

I declined showering, preferring to just own being dirty in public until the sun settles. Incorrectly thinking today is Sunday I put on a pair of ancient jeans and a wife beater, splashed water on my face, brushed my teeth, covered my eyes with shades and set out walking for iced coffee, and to purchase a handmade bar of Blackbeard's Spiced Rum Shaving Soap from the Soap Lady at the otherwise lame farmer's market downtown.

Just past the iced coffee phase I realized today is Saturday. No Soap Lady. No Blackbeard's Spiced Rum Shaving Soap. I briefly considered turning back, the despair of broken dreams. The confines of my garage apartment. I stared at the sun — which I often do in moments of decision and indecision, resulting in permanent hexagon-chain worm spots in my vision — and decided to roam.

Nearing the library that serves as one of the most disappointing circumstances of my current existence, guarded by mild and jovial crackheads cracking jibberish jokes, bumming smokes, and checking out the ladies, I heard the call of classical jazz, saw the amateurly Photoshopped orange slice enticements to Learn! and Grow! and thought why not? It's been awhile.

I knew I fit in fine unkempt and unclean but keeping my sunglasses on felt wrong. I did it anyway. I kept them on through the lobby circus, while reading the collection directory en español, and to cover my anger at its shallow help which had nothing to do with my (perfectly clear) understanding of spanish. I removed them once I was sitting safely on the floor in home base — science fiction — chugging coffee and idly reading jacket summaries while trying to ignore the mulleted guy with liquid heavy bubble breath staring obliquely and seeming to whiff at whichever of my particles were riding the draft through an open space on the S shelf until I could decide where to wander. I updated my Facebook status via text.

I picked up Lord Kelvin's Machine and kept it with me when I left SciFi. I did not intend to check it out, or anything out, because I owe money for two late movies, but I do like to keep a book with me in the library. Something to hold on to. Plus this book's back cover had a stereotypically steampunk but still pretty bitchin bald guy in dark goggles with electricity all around him. It also appeared to be semen-free.

Confining myself in an elevator with random library patrons is not something I do, as much as I'd like to, so I took the large, open, central staircase past the rows of homeless and working poor at the public computers on the second floor, up to the third floor, and to the 800s; rows upon rows upon rows, each quaintly labeled Non Fiction.

Earlier I'd thought to find some kind of compendium of humor, an objectively organized overview of the technicalities of comedy through history, but quickly squashed the urge to seek something particular. I hate the library because they rarely, and I do truly mean rarely, have the things I specifically seek. Biggest library in the Southeast and it has nothing I seek! And not just checked out or sitting at another branch. A shockingly high proportion of texts I want are simply absent from circulation in Orange County. Probably absent from all of Florida. I've given up getting all fired up to want to go look something up or research or find anything at the library because I will almost always be let down. This library is strictly a wandering library.

So I wandered, tapping Lord Kelvin's Machine against my left thigh and scanning shelves at a speed difficult to imagine oneself capable of when not actually doing it. An old book jumped out. Our Present Discontents by W.R. Inge. The table of contents was interesting enough for me to sit down on the floor and start reading.

William Ralph Inge, (rhymes with sing, not singe), was an Anglican priest and professor at Cambridge, born in 1860 and dead in 1954. Known as the Gloomy Dean for his supposedly pessimistic contributions to The Evening Standard, Inge took a Plato-drenched approach to Christian ethics re: social problems. Our Present Discontents is a book of essays published in 1938 when Inge was already rather old, with the mellowed perspective of a fairly reasonable human who's seen quite enough, thank you.

And I found him so funny!

A book of commentaries by some Anglican dean on current events such as the doings of dictators, skepticism of hilariously wrong international Population Reports, the state of education, religion, science, and the global economy and it was one of the best little nuggets I've read about 1938 English and international affairs in some time.

Year 1938. I recalled Ray Bradbury graduated high school right around 1938. He spent three days a week at the library to educate himself. Imagine Ray Bradbury at the library one day, overcome by a whim to read up on current affairs from an English perspective. Imagine he got it into his head to read the latest from W.R. Inge. Unlikely, but go with it. Imagine he looks it up, only to find the library doesn't have it. Imagine his disappointment.

This line of thought was boggling my mind so I put Our Present Discontents back on the shelf and went to the Third Floor Bookstore. I always make a point to scan the Third Floor Bookstore for some little gem worth more to me than the dollar I spend on it. Even though I hate the library, I feel compelled to contribute in this way, because it's the only way I can. Well, other than paying my fines.

Quickly passing over a lot of dreary fiction and still contemplating whether all the weighty aspects of Farenheit 451 were added only after the idea was born of a more mundane circumstance, like a thwarted thirst for Ingean wisdom, I looked for a copy of Lord Kelvin's Machine. Try my luck. Two other Blaylock titles, but not the one I wanted. I suddenly realized how very loud the music was in there. And, wait, Cocaine? Eric Clapton's Cocaine at such a volume in the glass box Third Floor Bookstore? Good frakking god, no! (Not that Cocaine shouldn't be archived and remembered, but... the closest cocaine comes to relating to libraries are the homeless crackheads.)

Another reason to hate the library, yet I gave my dollar proudly to the overweight platinum blond grandmother, despite getting no say in library dealings. Because I love libraries. I want them all to be magical storehouses of every living and undead thought ever printed, each its own Wonder of the World, worthy of being cited as the place where I actually educated myself.