Hi, this is Chris Hubs.

I don’t know why you’re listening to this, but since you are, let’s talk about libraries.

I mean, is there anything better than the public library?

It’s one of those concepts that if you tried to introduce it today and it didn’t already exist, I can’t imagine that people would get behind it.

What, we’re going to spend all this money just for free access to books?

But, I mean, what an amazing resource.

Librarians, just amazing people wanting to help out their community and serve and help people learn things.

Oh man, what a deal.

I remember the library I had as a small child in Fremont, Nebraska, the Keene Memorial Library.

I don’t know why I remember that name, but I looked it up and it’s still the Keene Memorial Library.

The picture doesn’t look familiar, though, so I’m going to guess they built a new building, which is only a little disappointing to me because I remember there being a fountain in the lobby of the library in Fremont, Nebraska.

But more importantly, I remember getting my own library card, which at the time was a paper thing with a little metal embossed number in it and my name typed on it.

And when you went to check out books, there was a little slip in the back of the book, a little card that went into the punch machine and made a really satisfying thunk as it put the due date and your library card number on that little reference card.

What a great deal.

From just elementary school age, I was raiding the children’s book section.

I remember still, gosh, being in elementary school and realizing that I could go into the grown-up section and check out LP records.

This would have been pre-dated CDs.

I’m old.

But yeah, being able to check out an LP and bring it home and play it, what a cool thing.

As I got older, the libraries changed as we moved around, but the ability to go and get books and just read voraciously stayed the same, and I continue to love it.

Since I moved to Iowa, I have been on a familiar basis with librarians at each of my local libraries.

Several years ago, I got asked to serve on the board of trustees for my local Hiawatha Public Library, and I have done that for the last six years, I guess.

A great little public service to be able to do.

We have been fortunate in being able to avoid a lot of the book content controversies that have hit other libraries and other places across the state and the country.

We did have to hire a new library director when our old library director retired.

That was a bigger task than I think any of us anticipated when we signed up to be trustees, but we found a good new director and happy to see the library on a path flourishing, not just with having books that they can check out and share with the community, but all sorts of community resources for Just helping people with their needs.

We’ve got a food bank in the lobby of our public library now that gets a lot of traffic, and volunteers come in to help bring the food to it that’s donated by various community organizations.

Individuals can bring in food from—they have access from their gardens or other things.

Bring it in, log it, put it on the shelf, and it goes out almost as quickly as it comes in.

Beautiful community resource and just wonderful to be able to have.

My usual library pattern ends up just heading for either a book that I’ve reserved and that’s on the shelf waiting for me, or the new book shelf tends to be where I browse, and I’m finding interesting things there, both in nonfiction biographies and a lot of science fiction.

If I want to read theology, they’re typically not going to have what I’m looking for, and usually there I will either buy the book.

I suppose I could go with the more aggressive interlibrary loan, but I’m not usually that patient, and so I will either buy it or I’ll put it on a wish list for later.

My friend Charles Crowley would remind me that I should also check my church library, which is remarkably well stocked and frequently has books that I either have purchased for myself and read already or that are on my wish list, and so I can take them off and just borrow them from the church library, another great resource.

If you haven’t been to your local library in a while, I encourage you: go visit, check out a book, read a book, or an audiobook, or some music, or goodness knows what else.

Whatever it is, I don’t think you’ll regret it.

We’ll talk later.