Maintaining the condition of the children’s collections in my branch is a matter of great professional pride for me. I take care to ensure that the books in my library are in good condition, especially the baby books – no one wants to take a grubby, grungy book home to their baby!
Part of keeping the stacks in good shape is periodically doing condition weeds, by taking the books off the shelf one by one and flipping through them in search of rips, tears and mysterious stains.
Recently, while going through the baby books, I came across this:
It was my very own “book baby”, published all the way back in 2017 (and now available in a rather fetching new board book format, if you’re interested), and it was looking a little worse for wear.
Flipping through the familiar pages, I noticed rips, tears, stains and smudges. It was without a doubt time for this book to say its final farewells and journey on to the recycling bin in the sky, as most library books must at some point.
While it’s always sad to say goodbye to a book, I must admit it filled me with pride to see this battered and worn copy of Wild One, as this kind of condition could mean only one thing – it had been very well loved.
Families had borrowed this book, children had held it and had turned and ripped and stained its pages. It had lived a full life, which is all you can hope for any book, but even more so for one you’ve written!
And so, a farewell poem to my own sweet summer child, Wild One.
They held you in their sticky hands,
stuck you in their gummy mouths,
dropped you from the kitchen table,
sofa, high chair, car seat, crib,
turned your pages back and forth,
sometimes gently,
most times not,
shared their squishy, squashy meals,
with a little saved for later,
tucked between your pages.
They read you, ripped you,
squeezed you, shared you.
wore you thin and wore you out.
Who could have asked for more?
While I do not suggest dripping pureed beef stew between the pages of a library book, when it comes to baby books, we all know that anything can happen – and usually does! So I hope you’ll join me in bidding adieu to this well-loved, and well-read, copy of Wild One.
The absolutely Irene is hosting Poetry Friday this week, at Live Your Poem!
Who could have asked for more, indeed! What a lovely discovery, such a well-loved copy of a book you authored…how satisfying and sweet. I love your poem, too. Thank you!
Thank you for your kind words! It is very satisfying. 🙂
Aww…Jane, how sweet! I have two boxes of my childhood books — actually they were shared amongst five of us; none of had our own! They’re a mess, but I just cannot part with them!
Oh, I absolutely have some of my precious childhood books still, too! We moved a lot, so I didn’t keep a lot of childhood items, but some books are just too special to let go.
Oh, this is such a tender post… here’s to well-loved books!
Agreed!! 🙂
Aw, Jane, it’s the sweetest goodbye to your own “Wild One”. Surely there will be a replacement! I love all the action laid upon that book!
Children do everything with so much gusto, even read their library books. 😀
How wonderful that your book was loved to death by all those wild readers! And you got a poem out of their enjoyment–win-win!
My feelings exactly! 😀
What a gift to see your book well-loved. Your poem is a sweet reminder of how our little ones read their books and share their love.
Oh yes, we’re always reminding children to use their gentle hands, but they’re enthusiasm sometimes gets the better of them! 😉
Jane, what a sweet story. I love your poem, and that you were the librarian that got to see the well-loved book needing retiring. “Who could have asked for more?” indeed. I bookmarked this book to get a couple to have on hand for new babies.
Oh, that’s lovely to hear! It’s always bittersweet to weed a book, but at least it’s nice to know it was well read! 🙂
Jane, you found one of you published books. I can tell when books have been loved by others but I am always thinking-don’t through them away. I can see why a librarian needs to weed through her books. Your poem was a fond goodbye to you Wild One book.
Alas we simply don’t have room to keep every book on our shelves, as we’re always adding shiny, beautiful new books! It’s quite the delicate balancing act, though sometimes books have been so very well loved by enthusiastic little hands that it’s easier to let go. 🙂
Oh, this warmed my heart and made me smile! Thanks to my daughter (a youth services librarian) I’m familiar with the need to weed. 🙂 How lovely that your own book baby has been handled by so many babies, and so enthusiastically. I love that! I hope the book now lives on library’s shelves in that new board book format!
I used to struggle with weeding – how hard it is to get rid of a book! But a more senior library revealed to me that weeding is actually a joyful thing, a celebration of books that have been loved the way books should be, especially children’s books. 🙂