I love the library.
For as long as I can remember, the library has been my world between worlds. It's my version of the train that takes Harry to Hogwarts, the wardrobe that brings them to Narnia.
There's something magical about walking into a place that carries so many worlds on it's shelves.
Before my to-be read pile became more than I could handle, I used to wander around and situate myself in the young adult corner of my library (or children's corner; or the adult fantasy section; it all depended on my mood) and just look through the titles and pull the books out that I wanted and make a pile twenty or thirty books high.
And then I would check them out and carry them out, barely able to see above my giant pile, and ride home and devour them all in a week or two, only to begin the process when I returned them all again.
The library was and is the place I wanted to spend all my time. I loved immersing myself in the books that they offered - it didn't matter if the story was sad or happy, a fantasy or a contemporary, an adult novel or a middle grade story. I loved it.
I don't understand people who say that libraries are bad. Is thinking bad? Loving bad? Reading bad? Do you think they're bad because they offer a wide variety of material? If you want a library designed specifically for you, you create your own with the books you buy. Don't take your hate out because they cater to everybody - that's part of what makes them so special in the first place. They don't tell somebody they can't do something or can't like something or can't read something. They don't judge.
And I don't understand people who say they "can't use library books." Why? Do you judge books that have been loved by other people before you came along? Because they're not in perfect condition or shiny new? Because there is something wrong with them? Library books offer more of an opportunity to explore than any book you can buy on a bookshelf - not because the books are different, but because they have been loved by somebody before you came along. It is a universal story, not one that you hog all to yourself. (Besides, how do you know you want to buy and keep a book until after you read it?)
Libraries, I love you. And I hate the people who dare think that it is okay to shut you down.
And librarians - you rock. Keep doing what you do.
And readers - you go to your library and give those books some more loving. There are worlds waiting for you, and nothing should keep you from them.