The Dream Palace
I had nowhere to go when I was a child. My mother was a strict woman, and in 1950s American, there were not many places that a young black girl could spend her time safely. She sometimes worked two or three jobs, often the night shift cleaning hotel ballroom floors, so the strategy she had for her youngest daughter’s safety was to limit her outside activities to only a few.
School had been one such place, at least for a while. I knew everyone who went to school with me; most of the children and I had been together since first grade. Back then we had shared scabby knees on the playground and learned to spell and color within the lines together. A few years later most of us would graduate 12th grade together, but still separate in 1960s America.
The other place that my mother allowed me to go was the grocery store. Not a big supermarket but a small neighborhood store owned by Mr. Johnny and his wife, an old Jewish couple who were kind and sometimes gave us penny candy just because they had such respect for my hardworking mother. I would drag out the time it took to get to the store, crisscrossing the streets, walking backwards, jumping over cracks in the sidewalks. Anything to kill time before going back home to our cramped little shot-gun house with its flush toilet outhouse and coal shed in the backyard.
My absolute all-time favorite place to spend a Saturday was the local library – Portland Library named for our neighborhood in Louisville, Kentucky. It was one of the few places that my mother approved of and didn’t seem to care how long I stayed in the stacks. The walk there was one that I, even now, could walk albeit more slowly but no less sure footed. Down Lytle Street, turn left at the corner, then a left on Portland Avenue, under the overpass, past the car repair shop, careful not to fall on the broken sidewalk. Back then I walked alone and, surprisingly, nothing happened to me. Maybe my mother thought I was safe since I was going to a place of books and learning. It may have never occurred to her that I could have been kidnapped, run over by a car, or physically assaulted without having reached the library at all. It never occurred to me either. That walk to the library was freedom, my own personal “F” word, and it meant the world to me.
The building itself was golden brick and round which was considered shockingly modern in those days with a long series of steps to the entrance. The librarians knew me on sight and sometimes would nod or smile in my direction as though I belonged there. I’d turn left to the children’s section and browse the books on each shelf before selecting two or three to read at a small round table preferably alone. When I was quite young, I’d drift towards every color fairytale book in the stacks – the red fairy tale book, the golden, the green, then Grimm’s – well, you get the idea. As I grew, my tastes changed towards westerns filled with adventure where the hero fights and shoots the bad guys and the Indians (no political correctness then I’m sorry to say) and wins the girl who was usually blonde and blue eyed. It never occurred to me question why my own likeness was missing from these stories. There were no brown skinned girls or boys to fight the good fight and save the day. As I grew even older, I began to skim through scores of books looking for anything with a hint of romance or sex regardless of the genre. A heaving bosom or passionate kiss was a valuable find, and I’d read those passages each time I went back to the library. It did not take much more than that to pique my interest. A few times I would sneak over to the adult side of the library to feed my hormonal itch, but a vigilant librarian would soon send me back to the children’s table and that was that. A few hours later, I would check out an armful of books and walk the entire way home carrying 10-12 at a time switching from right to left as my treasures grew heavier with each step home.
The library was my place, my extracurricular activity, my sock hop, my journalism club, my J.V. basketball game. All the events I wasn’t allowed to participate in as a girl. It held the excitement and mystery of all those activities and more. It created a certain expectation that I’ve carried for years in my life because I tend to judge a city by the quantity and quality of its libraries.
On vacation, I go to the main library of whatever small town I’m visiting, introduce myself to the librarians, and ask them what interesting sites they recommend for a short-term visit. This single act has directed me off the beaten path toward a pioneer graveyard in Northern California and a small gold mine on the outskirts of a mountain town. Depending on the length of my stay, sometimes they’d even let me check out a book or two because bibliophiles recognize and trust each other.
Years later on a visit to my brother in Kentucky, I made a special trip to see my old stomping ground, my place of refuge, my dream palace. As we drove up to the round building, it was somehow more worn and disheveled looking and smaller than I remembered. My heart was pounding, and I asked my sister-in-law to park and wait for me as I wanted to enter this sacred space alone as I had done so many times before. Tears welled in my eyes as I remembered the connection I’d had to this place and the many times I’d lost myself dreaming in its interior. Unlike years before, the door opened easily. I slipped inside and stopped. It had hardly changed. Of course, instead of a card catalog there was now a bright shiny computer and the librarians were much younger than any of them in my day, but they still sat behind the desk with welcoming smiles.
After a moment to collect my emotions, I introduced myself and told them what the library had done for me so many years ago. They listened politely, but I could tell they had written me off as a strange old lady with strange old memories. No matter. I had returned to where my love of reading, my passion to write, and my desire to know everything had begun. It wasn’t exactly the same because I wasn’t the same, but I sat at one of the small tables in the children’s section and took a deep breath. I felt the walls and stacks welcoming me back home and I smiled. As I said, bibliophiles recognize and trust each other…still.
Wilma Fuller is an emerging writer who teaches English at an urban community college in Oakland, CA. She has an M.F.A. in Creative Writing from Mills College and lives in the California Bay Area with her wife.
