Can a Book Heal the World?

Kirstie David is a Literacy and Outreach Librarian at the Morrill Memorial Library in Norwood, MA. Look for her article in the March 26, 2020 edition of the Transcript &  Bulletin.

I recently read a remarkable book. Actually, it was an audiobook narrated by the author, and once I began, I found it hard to stop. While not all narrators are created equally I can confirm that this one is delightful; the soothing cadence of her voice is like a lullaby for the soul.

Robin Wall Kimmerer’s “Braiding Sweetgrass” should be required reading. I mention this to everyone I’ve told about the book, and nobody asks for whom it should be required. Maybe they assume I mean school children. I actually mean it should be required reading for anyone who wants to live on the planet. Hyperbole? Probably. Yet perhaps a universal playbook is just what we need to heal the fragile ecology of our world.

Falling Between the Cracks

Librarian April Cushing is head of Adult and Information Services at the Morrill Memorial Library. Read her column published in the March 19, 2020 issue of the Norwood Transcript & Bulletin.

I think I’m officially losing it. In this case, “it” refers to pretty much anything of importance I lay hands on. My mother called it carelessness. It’s not a recent affliction with me, but it may be getting worse. It’s definitely getting more frustrating. After my most recent episode, I realize I need to take action.

I come from a long line of losers. My forebears (by marriage) lost waterfront property on the coast of Maine by neglecting to pay the taxes. My immediate loved ones have misplaced everything from wallets to watches, cell phones to shoes, coats to cameras (remember them?). I managed to lose one of my few valuable pieces of jewelry—a single sapphire earring--at my daughter’s wedding in England last year. I beat myself up over that one for days.

Not long ago I got a call from a recycling company in Ohio. Had I left a laptop on an Amtrak train to DC last summer? No, but the daughter to whom I’d lent it had, I discovered. I couldn’t even be mad at her because it’s exactly the sort of thing I’d do. My new friend at the recycling company reset the password and mailed it back to her in Brooklyn, gratis.

A couple months ago I lost my keys. I lent them to one of my kids who borrowed my car and did, in fact, return them. Moments later I sped off to the Cape for the weekend in my trusty, keyless-entry Prius. When I pulled into the Harwich Stop & Shop and tried to lock the car containing my priceless (to me) pup, the key fob was nowhere to be found. I checked pockets, purse, on the seat, under the seat, around the seat. Nothing. But since I was able to restart the car by simply pushing the ignition switch, I wasn’t too worried. The key, with its proximity sensor, had to be nearby. When I got to the house I turned off the car, then immediately tried powering it back up. Upon hearing it purr to life I unpacked the Prius and figured I’d find the key in the light of day.

Finding a Treasure Trove

Nancy Ling is the Outreach Librarian at the Morrill Memorial Library in Norwood, Massachusetts.  Read Nancy’s column in the March 12, 2020 issue of the Transcript and Bulletin.

When someone you love is suddenly gone from your life, there are obvious things that you will miss—their captivating smile, their warm embrace, that goofy joke they told at every family gathering.

Not surprisingly there are other heartaches that we cannot anticipate or measure—things we never imagined that we would long for after a loved one passes away. This was the case with my father. This April it will have been two years since he departed and I am shocked at how quickly we have forgotten some of his character traits and idiosyncrasies. For a while, I couldn’t find any recordings of his voice, and I was distraught. Yes, I remembered exactly how he would say “Hello Nana-Banana” when he gave me a hug, but I wanted to remember more, each intonation. Thankfully, several friends and family members found recordings on their phones that they shared with me, one even highlighted his laughter which was a treasure to hear.

The Printers' Daughter

Charlotte Canelli is the library director of the Morrill Memorial Library in Norwood, Massachusetts. Read Charlotte's column in the March 5, 2020 edition of the Transcript &Bulletin.

This past week, I was yanking some memento out of the bottom of a long-forgotten box, when a small metal plate slipped out of a booklet. It was a three by one-and-one-half inch engraved plate - a metal negative of a photo of my mother. I remembered the photograph well. It accompanied an article in a printed newspaper or newsletter published over a half-century ago. 

In the early 1960s, Mrs. Carolyn Fitzgerald had been elected to the office of President of the Women's Auxiliary to the Typographical Union in Oakland, California. I flipped the metal right to left and revealed an image of a beautiful, perfectly coiffed young mother in her thirties. Flipping it again, of the metal plate exposed the negative image of the same photo.

That day, I was reminded of the newspaper printing business that defined my childhood. In 1959, my soon-to-be stepfather left his job as a typesetter at the Worcester Telegram and Evening Gazette. He and his brother, Bill Fitzgerald, had heard there were plenty of printing opportunities, particularly typesetting, in the newspaper industry in the San Francisco Bay Area.  Like pioneers, they were the advance team, moving to the west coast, getting decent-paying union jobs, and setting up apartments to await their families. My mother, my brother, and I made the transatlantic journey from Boston to San Francisco on TWA and settled into that unique college town called Berkeley.