Ah, the whiff of old paper, musty dusty shelves of stiff, crinkly knowledge from ages gone by. I remember so very fondly of the libraries of my youth. I would have to say that my favorite was the old Metairie Library just down the street from where my grandparents lived when I was just entering the teenage years.

Back then, every summer was spent in New Orleans, and I eagerly awaited for summer to arrive. My grandfather loved books and we would routinely go to the library or an old used bookstore that was set up in a creaky old house nearby to get our fill of books to read for a week. I would peruse the sci-fi and fantasy aisles, looking for some fanciful novel by Andre’ Norton or Robert Heinlein that I hadn’t already read, while my grandfather would look through the westerns or serial thrillers.

Whether it was the dust that was ever present, or just the smell of old paper that had been in a humid, hot environment too long, there was something so relaxing, so comforting about those places. Almost from the moment you entered the noise of the outside world disappeared and the comforting smells of the books would engulf you, promising wondrous adventures, or just a relaxing browse through the familiar paperback spine of books already read, the characters now your friends, saying hi for just a moment as you persue the shelf.

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