My first stop was the Hollis branch of QBPL. As I've written before, defining a neighborhood can be tricky: google maps places this QBPL branch outside its definition of Hollis. Wikipedia has two zip codes for Hollis: 11412 and 11423, and the latter includes the public library. Searching census.gov for data on the zip codes doesn't clarify matters, and no maps are included.
As Wikipedia has it, Hollis is a residential middle-class predominantly African-American neighborhood ... with small minorities of Hispanics and Indians. I agree. I parked a long block away from the library, off Hillside Avenue (the major thoroughfare in the neighborhood). As I walked from my car an adorable girl who might've been three engaged me; as she babbled she reminded me of my grandson, who isn't yet two, but is as cute as that girl. Her sari-clad mother seemed pleased by our conversation; I know I was.
The library was built in 1974, in an architectural style someone in 1974 must've thought, what, attractive? functional?
Futuristic? Ugly?
I mustn't be so harsh in my judgements, I suppose. Yet I must add that in this picture the library looks better than I did when I went there. It has an institutional feel, and that is not meant as a compliment.
Inside, it resembled other QBPL libraries I've visited recently. A librarian's desk, shelving with books and films and music, material displays, and computers. It is one large room divided into sections by imaginary boundaries. The building area measures 7,500 square feet — which doesn't sound as small as its 92 feet x 89 feet size; it's small.
Just one big square room.
Yet I felt comfortable in it. Having worked as a librarian for twelve years, having attended library school in my 50s as I transitioned from an unsatisfying business career terminated by yet another corporate downsizing, I well know how public libraries fit into our society: reluctantly accepted as necessary by many, grudgingly funded, their budgets are early victims to belt-tightening at precisely such times when people can most benefit from their resources.
A couple of decades ago New York City libraries had their hours slashed, budgets lacerated as politicians sought to stanch red ink and punish those least capable of voting them out of office. Taxes are abated for business which don't need the help but desire it, while kids and parents are told tough it out, we all have to tighten out belts.
I'm reminded of the song Somebody else's troubles by Steve Goodman, a singer whose work I loved; he sang
And I saw the boss come a-walkin' down along that factory line
He said, "We all have to tighten up our belts."
But he didn't look any thinner than he did a year ago
And I wonder just how hungry that man felt
Anyway. I mustn't get serious or nostalgic, I suppose, though I'm allowed, cause it's my blog. Back to libraries.
I headed back to my car after using the bathroom —facilities, rest room; we're still stuck on not saying that word — and returning the key, which was attached that that thingamajig which holds books at the end of a shelf. I said to the librarian, well, that won't get away, and she said to me that is actually a replacement; the prior one, I joined her in saying developed wings. We librarians know about books and DVDs and bathroom keys which magically disappear.
Heading out, I passed this pitiable sight. I gotta admit, and do readily, that (as usual) I am damned sick of winter; but this is pitiful, a few square feet onto which people mindlessly throw this thrash and dogs pee on —this is a garden? My old suburban library had a nice garden tended to by conscientious librarians (there aren't many of any other kind, I well know), and that garden was larger. But I suppose you gotta take what you can get.
I walked back to my car, and headed south, not along traffic-chocked Francis Lewis Boulevard, but along side streets: I know this part of Queens well enough to feel comfortable driving, especially with my map app as co-pilot.
Across Hollis Avenue, I found a parking spot on 204th Street, across from the Renaissance Middle School. Walking back to Hollis Avenue, and took a picture:
That this library building was constructed in 1974 does not surprise me; what is a surprise is that it was renovated in 2009 — really? Renovated? How did it look in 2008?
Remember Vince Piranha? Cruel, but just.
On walking inside the library, I saw th usual arrangement: computers, a Teens section, shelved with books and media — and a ping pong table. Say again? I was taken aback, to say the least. Looking around for a bathroom key, I kept glancing at it.
Sir? a soft, resounding, gentle baritone asked; when I said I was looking for the rest room key he told me there was no key. I went in, still thinking about what I'd just seen. When I went back out I walked over to the librarian's desk — I didn't need a sign to tell me whom that was — and said, I must tell you this is the first time I've seen a ping pong table inside a library.
In the Phoenicia Library, upstate, I've seen fishing tackle and ukuleles, but I have never seen a ping pong table inside a library.
That led to a long conversation. Mister Reginald St. Fort s the Community Library Manager (I like that title), and he is a presence. Affable, friendly, he is a commanding presence, a librarian with unabashed ideas and boundless enthusiasm about what a public librarian and a public library can and should be. I liked him greatly. He and I talked for a good quarter hour, and I enjoyed myself greatly.
When I said I was on my way to get lunch at an old favorite, a tiny Jamaican restaurant which well earns the loving sobriquet a hole in the wall, Reggie said he loved their fish soup; he, too, knew Fishnet. And he suggested an easy way to get there from here.
Achee wasn't to be had, alas. I was advised most people had it for breakfast; I told the young lady behind the counter I wasn't used to being there so late in the afternoon. I settled for jerk chicken with rice and peas and boiled cabbage. Sublime.
I stopped into the QBPL St. Albans branch.
Clearly it is not well used, or has an abysmally small budget: it has no scheduled programs for the month of March. I am not enough of a sociologist, if at all, nor inclined toward deep analysis thereto, but I found the schedule ... if it were my home library, I'd feel insulted. I checked my disappointment and went on my way.
Not many blocks away I passed this intersection. John Coltrane lived down the block from here for a spell. Not far form here, other jazz royalty lived; that is another post for another time.