Books in the Time of Exhaustion

Kate Tigue is the Assistant Children's Librarian at the Morrill Memorial Library. Read her column in the May 11th edition of the Norwood Transcript and Bulletin.

Every expectant mother goes through a period of anxiety when she imagines what life will be like after the baby arrives. Will anything be the same? It’s one of those rubicon moments that you can’t totally fathom until it happens. Most of us realize that life will never be the same once a child enters the picture but understanding the enormity and permanence of that change can take some time to process.

One of my chief worries during pregnancy about life as a new mom was wondering how I would keep reading. Compared to concerns about the baby’s health, it’s a little trivial but reading is my only lifelong hobby. I’ve never been dedicated to crafting or outdoor pursuits or any other recreational activity. Reading has been one of the constants in my life since childhood and the one thing I truly love to do. Like many moms-to-be, I was trying to figure out how I could hang on to some small part of myself during an intense life change.

In the La La Land of Dreams

Charlotte Canelli is the library director of the Morrill Memorial Library in Norwood, Massachusetts. Read Charlotte's column in the May 4, 2017 edition of the Norwood Transcript and Bulletin.

Each year after the Academy Award nominations have been announced, I begin a manic quest to see as many of the top movie contenders as I can. I’m apparently not the only one who needs to catch up because theaters across the county hold marathons screenings in those weeks before the Oscar ceremony.

I haven’t had the time to sit in a darkened movie theater for a few weekends so I watch those nominated films that are available on video or On Demand at home in the comfort of my own easy chair. Or I scramble from theater to theater in those last few weeks, always missing a few movies that seem to only be screened at the art spots in and around Boston. (Luckily, we have a terrific little gem of a theater in the town next door at the Dedham Community Theater and they always have a handful of Oscar candidates on either of their two big screens.)

D-Day in a Day

Librarian April Cushing is head of Adult and Information Services at the Morrill Memorial Library. Read her column published in the April 27 issue of the Norwood Transcript Bulletin.

“You are about to embark upon the Great Crusade, toward which we have striven these many months. The eyes of the world are upon you. The hopes and prayers of liberty-loving people everywhere march with you… We will accept nothing less than full victory!”  Yikes. Talk about pressure.

Standing Beside Our Bill of Rights

Charlotte Canelli is the library director of the Morrill Memorial Library in Norwood, Massachusetts. Read Charlotte's column in the April 20, 2017 edition of the Norwood Transcript and Bulletin.

Unlike the Ten Commandments that I memorized in Sunday School, I admit that I haven’t been quite as painstakingly thorough with the first ten amendments of our Bill of Rights. I can readily refer to the First Amendment (freedom or religion, speech, press, assembly and petition) and the Second (right to bear arms).  Yet, the other eight get a little vague as I search around in my memory for them.

More Than Little Green Men and Faeries

Read Alli Palmgren's column in the April 23, 2017 edition of the Norwood Transcript and Bulletin. Alli is the Technology Librarian at the Morrill Memorial Library.

I am a very eclectic reader. There is hardly a genre that won’t grace my to-read pile. For that reason, I really enjoy the Reader’s Bingo competition that the library holds periodically (OK, so everyone else thinks that it is a game, but I can make anything into a blood sport).

The Stories of S-Town

Charlotte Canelli is the library director of the Morrill Memorial Library in Norwood, Massachusetts. Read Charlotte's column in the April 6, 2017 edition of the Norwood Transcript and Bulletin.

Season One of the astonishingly-popular Serial podcast had a profound effect on an entire world of listeners. When the 12-episode podcast ended on December 18, 2014, there had been 40 million downloads but I was not one of them. I discovered it sometime later, in the spring of 2015, and I binge-listened to every single minute, totally addicted.

Make It Work

Liz Reed is the Adult and Information Services Librarian at the Morrill Memorial Library in Norwood, Massachusetts. Read Liz's column in the March 30, 2017 edition of the Norwood Transcript and Bulletin.

“Everything old is new again.” We’ve all heard variations of this famous line, usually applied to fashion. We’re supposed to change our wardrobes seasonally, and seasonal staples change from year to year. All fans of Project Runway know that the fashion world moves quickly; as Heidi Klum says, “In fashion, one day you’re in, the next day – you’re out.”

Who Loves Opera

Charlotte Canelli is the library director of the Morrill Memorial Library in Norwood, Massachusetts. Read Charlotte's column in the March 23, 2017 edition of the Norwood Transcript and Bulletin.

Gerry and I were listening to Sirius’s The 70s channel on a long turnpike ride home from our New Jersey children. There’s nothing better than a Sunday afternoon riding shotgun, my knitting in my lap, while I occasionally look up to notice the landscapes of New York, Connecticut and Rhode Island slide by. Knowing most of the words to the songs on the radio is a bonus.  Gerry and I often switch to the 60s so that we know ALL the words to the songs. We were simply Groovin’ on a Sunday Afternoon.

As we were singing along to The Pinball Wizard, the Who’s rock opera Tommy came to mind that afternoon.  Images from the 1975 musical and Roger Daltrey’s luscious golden curls apparently entered my consciousness from that area of my hard-driven brain that stores my young adulthood memories.

The Creative Potential of Freckles

Sam Simas is a Technology Assistant at the Morrill Memorial Library this winter and spring. Read Sam's column in the March 16, 2017 issue of the Norwood Transcript and Bulletin.

As a child, when I still drank grape-flavored juice-boxes and stared into the sky, my friend Emily sat with me at a splintered picnic table under Camp Y--’s pavilion and taught me that my freckles had creative potential; that I could use pens or permanent markers or lip-stick and do what she did: connect one dot to the other, make a diamond, or a sailboat, or a horse (she had a lot of freckles).  But my freckles have always been too linear; I could come up with a line, or at best a slanting Orien’s Belt.  Otherwise, I let myself become dejected by the inferior quantity of my skin abnormalities.  For this, I need someone to blame, and so I blamed the sun.

            In defiance of my mother and father, I abandoned all SPF and counted the hours of direct sunlight I could catch on my arms.  Sometimes, in school, I would sit in the window and roll my sleeves back, hoping for a freckle or two.  This, as you may imagine, did not work.  After many years of bright pink sunburn at Camp Y--, no more freckles had appeared on my arms, and I stopped trying to keep up with Emily and her horse-shaped freckle constellations.

I’d learned a lot from trying to fry my skin, more perhaps than a kid should have known; that the sun’s rays were once measured with a Campbell-Stokes sunshine recorder (think of a magnifying glass for frying ants, but adult-sized), and fascination with the power of weather lead to me to explore other weather phenomena: tornadoes, floods, earthquakes, volcanoes, etc. 

Rediscover James Michener

Charlotte Canelli is the library director of the Morrill Memorial Library in Norwood, Massachusetts. Read Charlotte's column in the March 9, 2017 edition of the Norwood Transcript and Bulletin.

When I was a young teenager in the mid-1960s, the young adult genre of books was a mish-mash of Nancy Drew, Sue Barton, The Hardy Boys, Little Women, Treasure Island and David Copperfield. Once we teens had devoured all of those books, including Black Stallion, Johnny Tremain and I Capture the Castle, we seemed to move quickly and deliberately into books written for adults. We read John Steinbeck’s Mice and Men, Conrad Richter’s A Light in the Forest, and Ray Bradbury’s Fahrenheit 451. We carried dog-eared copies of Betty Smith’s A Tree Grows in Brooklyn, Pearl Buck’s Good Earth, Tolkien’s Lord of the Rings, and Steinbeck’s Grapes of Wrath.

           

There were many of us who wanted something more meaningful than the romance, science fiction, and adventure written in the 40s and 50s for teenagers. Bestselling author Steve Berry writes that “what we now know as the young adult genre [in the early 60s] had yet to be invented”. Steven King’s Carrie was a decade away and J.K. Rowling’s Harry Potter was more than 30 years from being published.

Discovering an Old Spirit

Diane Phillips is the Technical Services Librarian at the Morrill Memorial Library.  Read Diane's  column in the March 2, 2017 edition of the Norwood Transcript and Bulletin.

I took my first sip of bourbon at Thanksgiving.  A few friends gathered for a Friendsgiving celebration and I was bringing dessert.  I didn't want to bring a traditional pie or cake.  That was boring to me.  I remembered seeing a book in our collection that had caught my eye – "Baked Elements: Our 10 Favorite Ingredients" by Matt Lewis and Renato Poliafito.  The cover of the book is well done and inviting but it was the layout that really captured my attention and got me to look into it further.  Each chapter of recipes is organized by the authors' favorite ingredients that are found in many popular dessert staples such as peanut butter, caramel, cinnamon and chocolate.  Chapter four is what got me curious - Booze.  I knew that spirits are used in both cooking and baking but I hadn't tried adding any to desserts that I've made in the past, so I was intrigued. The first recipe listed in the Booze chapter is Bourbon, Vanilla, and Chocolate Milk Shakes.  That sounded, and looked, really good and super easy to do.  I had my dessert! 

Fireside Reads

Margot Sullivan is a part-time reader's advisory and reference librarian at the Morrill Memorial Library. Read her column as published in the February 23, 2017 edition of the Norwood Transcript and Bulletin.

“Me thinks that the moment my legs begin to move, my thoughts begin to flow”Henry David Thoreau
“If I could not walk far and fast, I think I should just explode and perish”Charles Dickens
“Thoughts come clearly while one walks”Thomas Mann

      Walking has become a part of my daily routine – not just around the house but outside in my neighborhood or with friends whenever I can. The joys of walking are multitude.  I greet neighbors walking their dogs.  I am not a dog person (cats are my favorite) but have met some nice friendly well-behaved dogs. There is one orange and white cat who rules the street on my route and I delight seeing him roll in front of me on “his” street.  I might hear or see a bird or two (and remember how much my husband enjoyed bird-watching) or check the local pond for ducks! I watch for hawks sitting high up in the trees or in the sky.  I occasionally see our postman who has family on an island in Maine so, of course, I check in with him as I have a house on a Maine island. While walking last week a neighbor said “I have just read the best book – ‘News of the World’ by Paulette Jiles”.

Forget Monopoly! Let's Play Eurogames

Jeff Hartman is the Senior Circulation Assistant, Paging Supervisor, and Graphics Designer at the Morrill Memorial Library. Read Jeff's column in the February 16, 2017 edition of the Norwood Transcript and Bulletin.

Growing up, everyone has a favorite board game. Mine was Scrabble.  I memorized all the two- letter words and most of the three-letter words. I knew that in a pinch, you could get rid of a pesky Q by playing QAT or QI and that great parallel plays depended on ridiculous Scrabble-only “words” like AA, OE, or UT. But there were other games that I liked less.  Sometimes a lot less. Monopoly was probably my least favorite.

At least my family and friends didn’t have the habit of stealing money from the bank. But the game would always start with miserable inequality and get worse from there – one person would get Baltic and Connecticut Avenues, another would get Park Place and Boardwalk, and a third would somehow end up with all the railroads. Hours would pass as players were slowly forced into debt and mortgages, to be strung along by Chance or Community Chest or Free Parking, but still agonizingly moving towards defeat for all but one.

Love Letters for the Library

Charlotte Canelli is the library director of the Morrill Memorial Library in Norwood, Massachusetts. Read Charlotte's column in the February 9, 2017 edition of the Norwood Transcript and Bulletin.

 It’s no secret that many of you love the Morrill Memorial Library. We receive compliments each day – at all the desks of the library – from many of you.

Often, we hear it on Norwood’s community Facebook page, Norwood Now. You praise us for the print books and magazines we have in the library. You love the streaming and downloading services we offer 24/7. You are thrilled that we now offer appointments for passport and notary services.

Mindfulness is Everywhere

Bonnie Wyler is a Literacy/Outreach Librarian at the library. Read Bonnie's column in the February 2, 2017 edition of the Norwood Transcript and Bulletin.

When I was in my teens and twenties, it seemed to me that my parents worried about everything.  I was determined that I would never worry like they did when I grew older.  I would be calm and relaxed and take all of life’s ups and downs in stride.  Now I know better.  As I’ve gotten older, I’ve found that worry and stress are my constant companions.  The challenges of work, parenting adult children, and aging, not to mention worrying about the state of the world, cause me stress from which I find it difficult to escape.  It appears I’m not the only one struggling with the stresses of 21st century living.  One researcher reported that 7 in 10 Americans suffer from physical symptoms due to stress, and 67% reported high levels of daily stress.  Given that ongoing daily stresses can contribute to serious health problems, as well as taking away from enjoyment of life, what can we do to manage our stress?  One answer is mindfulness.