Last night, we did something I’ve been wanting to do for a long, long time. Well, at least as long as we’ve lived here, which is exactly 51 days.

When I was a kid, living in a small town in Central Illinois, nothing made me happier than going to the library to get a stack of books to read. That’s how I spent my spring breaks, and summer vacations throughout my childhood, sitting in my red vinyl bean bag, reading library books.

Our new town library is A TOP TEN LIBRARY, a fact that they are very proud of. There are banners announcing it in the streets, and in the library, and on the library brochures, in the parades, and on the website. But I don’t know what TOP TEN LIBRARY means, and they don’t tell you. Does it mean that they made David Letterman’s top ten list? Or that they are one of the Top Ten Libraries in the City? State? Country? In the whole World? Hard to say, because there’s no qualifiers, anywhere.

We went to the library and got our official library cards last night. We were assisted by a kind and friendly librarian, who Robert thought looked like one of my cousins. She helped us with the procedure of getting a card. It was very easy. I thought maybe because they are a TOP TEN LIBRARY that we would have to go through a lot of red tape hurdles to get our official cards. But we didn’t, and we were all set in about ten minutes.

Our new library card allows us to go to any neighboring suburb, or even back to the Chicago Public Library, to check out books. Any book we want! Even if it’s not a Top Ten Library!

We looked around, and I scooped up books like a kid in a candy store, and ran out, laughing. AND THERE’S NO LIMIT TO THE NUMBER OF BOOKS YOU CAN CHECK OUT!

That makes it a NUMBER ONE LIBRARY in my book.