Don’t you just love libraries and book stores? I get all warm and fuzzy when I’m in a book store. It comes from a love for books that began nearly sixty years ago when mama took us all to the children’s room of the public library for the Saturday morning book readings by Miss Amy.

Even now, I can feel that same magic I felt as a child the moment mama opened the heavy library door and herded us into the enormous entrance lobby. With each step up the stairs to the main room, my imagination awoke and grew with eager anticipation. The towering shelves of books rose on either side of me and were visible in any direction I turned. It filled me with such awe and wonder. Stories and adventures were literally everywhere, and I wanted to hear every one of them!

Miss Amy always sat in a rocking chair. “The Chosen Book” was in her lap and her hands rested upon it, as she waited for the oval rug in front of her to fill with children. I sat quietly, struggling to contain my growing excitement. What wonderful book had she picked to read that day? Where would the new adventure take me? Would it be sad, or funny, or maybe, even filled with danger? It didn’t really matter. I knew I would ride the invisible roller coaster of the author’s words anywhere and everywhere for as long as it lasted.

Then, suddenly, it was time. Miss Amy welcomed us to Story Time, as she slowly opened “The Chosen Book”. With the very first sentence, I was captured and the magic began. I was no longer me, sitting on a rug in the children’s room of the public library. I was living within her words and magically transported in time and space. That’s when I knew I wanted to someday, somehow, create that very same wonder and magic through words.

That little girl is all grown up now, but, magically, I still relive the awesome wonder I knew as a child when I’m surrounded by books in libraries and book stores. In a book store, of course, I have the added advantage of being able to own the books that I’ve always loved so much. Oh, and it’s always a special treat when some of the books I’m surrounded by in a book store or library are mine.