Breaking Up is Hard to Do, Or Why Leaving Two Libraries for One Really Sucks

I'm about to do something I've done loads of times before. I'm moving on from one public library to another. I've done this in the past for many different reasons, and this time it's really as simple as moving to a new home, a new neighborhood, and a new public library system. The kicker this time, however, is that for the past six months, I've been the proud owner of two - count 'em! - two public library cards. Having grown up in a small community and then having attended college in an only slightly larger community, county lines were all very important in terms of who could get a public library card without having to pay massive yearly fees. But lo and behold, and much to my pleasant surprise, this is not so in the Big City. Here, counties blend one into another like nobody's business, and those tricky rules enforcing library proximity are pretty relaxed. So this year, for the first time ever, I was privy to the delight of two - count 'em! - two public library cards.

The great thing about having two library cards is that (a) you have nearly limitless access to anything you could possibly want to check out (for surely one of the two systems would have what you're looking for) and (b) it means you can have approximately a thousand books checked out at a time and no one even nods a head. (Well, that's not entirely true after all. I do have a husband who would patiently step over massive piles of books strewn about and have the decency to look only slightly puzzled as to why I might need to have so many out at any given time.) This also requires a good deal of organization, which happens to be something I live for. I mean really, it's right up there with aforementioned husband and small mountains of books in my living room. Trust me, post-it notes and due dates are the very dear friends of a girl with two library cards. Seriously.

Now that I'm going back to one public library (anyone thinking Flowers for Algernon here?), I have to admit that I'm a bit sad and a bit confused. The library system I'm moving into is actually quite good (I was in this same system some years ago) but it just isn't the same as having two - count 'em! - two stiff, shiny library cards nestled lovingly in my bag, just waiting to be scanned for the next big stack. Perhaps I'll get lucky and find that Big City rules don't apply in the suburbs either? Or maybe I'll just have to make my trips to the bookshop a bit more frequent.