Month: November 2020

For the love of libraries

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In Exeter Central Library in the ‘80s there was a rocking horse. It sat in the children’s section, regal in its chestnut glory. I waved as I rode to save the fairy kingdom. Later I would thumb through musty picture books. I remember the pleasure of choosing, of lugging my favourites to the desk. The librarian would smile as she stamped return dates inside. Then we’d leave hand in hand, taking the libraries looping path to the city below.

I believe that libraries are one of life’s greatest gifts. Whatever your wealth you can sign up and dig into their treasures. This is socialism in action, the equity of knowledge – of escape through books. The pleasure of reading has followed me from child to adult. Yet a national decline in children reading for pleasure is a trend we should all be worried about.

It is equally shocking to learn that the last 10 years has seen the closure of a fifth of UK libraries. This has worked against librarians advocacy for the joy of reading. On top, the Chartered Institute of Public Finance and Accountancy (CIPFA) highlights a 29.6% reduction in national library spend. Whilst the government blames local decision-makers and vice versa, the public are losing out.

With over a quarter of a million pupils facing literacy poverty and 7.1 million adults struggling to read you’d think this would be a national crisis. But the ‘powers that be’ seem unfazed. Maybe it suits them to leave it this way. Who needs an educated populace challenging the status quo.

But libraries aren’t just places of learning, they are refuges too. Their warmth draws the weary and lonely, the troubled and displaced. They provide a meeting place, a safe space through challenging times.

How many if us know about the 1850’s Public Libraries Act? This pivot point in English social history was driven by reformers and philanthropists. Shoot forward 170 years and we barely celebrate this landmark moment. In our hi-tech, consumer world we’re more likely to order books online than trudge to the library. Yet the libraries social value is as important today as it ever was – maybe more so.

When life gets hard and our pockets empty we can go to the library and get lost in a book. This cost-free ability to escape, to learn and takeaway must not be taken for granted.

We must stand up for our libraries at this critical time. These houses of knowledge need us to shout loud. Above all we must speak up for the less fortunate, the folk that depend on them – for community and hope.

“But libraries are about freedom. Freedom to read, freedom of ideas, freedom of communication. They are about education (which is not a process that finishes the day we leave school or university), about entertainment, about making safe spaces, and about access to information.”

Neil Gaiman, Writer (extracted from a lecture for The Reading Agency 2013

Oh middle age blues

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How did I get here this near half of 90? This middle age, mid-life, midway. How do I feel when I look in the mirror; lines feather eyes, the upturn of mouth.

Society idolises the beauty of youth. Airbrushed Venus’ pout from our screens. We fight the years – buy pills and potions for fear of the ‘after.’

Middle age taunts us like a laughing clown. We run from its mirth to plough pool and pound pavement. We fight the loosening of skin that we poured into lycra.

As milestone birthdays pass it’s easy to fall into the slough. From experience, dodge the photo album’s lure – this only leads to weeping over wine.

At this middle age we can either hark back or look forward. It’s a moment to choose a cup half full versus empty. But its tempting to dwell in self pity, on the beach, in my mumsuit as bronzed nymphs breeze by – oh!

Yet we can’t turn back time. There’s still life to live. Those younger years weren’t all halcyon. My skin was smoother but insecurities hung like the beads around my neck.

I’m beginning to see that in ageing we lose and we gain. In accepting ourselves right here, right now we can start to reframe. We can map a new path.

For there’s strength in my life experience. There’s beauty in the evidence I have laughed. There’s a power in my self-knowledge – in the history that I own.

Middle age, indeed any age is bitter sweet. But life is there for living every day. It’s what we choose to do with it that counts. So I’m hanging up my hang ups. I’m saying bye bye to yesterday. I’m running towards the future with hope in my heart.

The memory of touch

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I have a memory of a cool banister, under my hand. The ridges of wallpaper, at the top of the stair. The tiled sills, cool to touch. The good sofa, smooth with piped edges. The stones in the box, inlaid with shell. The click of the light – on / off.

I am awake-dreaming. I am recalling the memory of a red brick house which was once my home. This remembrance is not just in my head – its trace flows to the tips of my fingers.

What magic is this? How can I recall these nooks of a place, 12 years on? It seems our sense of touch or haptic memory is more enduring than first realised.

Studies suggest that, moments of touch – the memory of an object – it’s dimensions and texture, can last long after that point of contact.

This fascinates me. As humans we hold onto certain memories like a raft sometimes. Whilst remembrance can be selective, looking back can help us understand our past and face our futures.

In a year when we’ve been kept from loved ones, it makes sense for us to hark back. Covid has raised our present and past senses. At times, a flood of feeling has knocked us sideways. Maybe this is catharsis of sorts? Out of control, we’re anchored by memory points; our nostalgia soothes us.

Then I get to thinking, what of those fallen by dementia? The loss of memory in times like these is all the more cruel. The half familiar faces crowding at the door way, unable to come close.

Whilst true, haptic memory is more elusive in dementia patients, scientists have found peripheral tactile stimulation impacts visual and verbal memory. It seems that ‘touch’ remains a powerful, enriching sense.

So, my retracing of steps makes all the more sense right now. Whatever our state of health or mind, the anchors of memory can hold us.

I have a memory of a cool banister, under my hand. The ridges of wallpaper, at the top of the stair. I visit there from time to time, it reminds me of where I come from.