Pick. Scan. Read. For Free.

To prepare for my trip to Puerto Vallarta, Mexico, I went to the public library to pick-up some beach reading. I hadn’t visited the library to check-out books unrelated to school since before J-school, instead borrowing books from friends or family, and sticking mostly to a diet of news. Stepping inside a public library always brings back memories of the library in Lancaster, California with my Grandma Barry (a children’s librarian who this blog is dedicated to).

There was story time, sitting in a circle on the deep red carpet decorated with the alphabet and numbers. Then, there was the stamping of books, my favorite part. I would perch myself next to Grandma as she checked-out library books.  Grandma would look at the patron’s library card, open the flap of the book, take out the card and file it, grab her date stamper, wheel to the correct month, date and year, ink the stamper up in black and press firmly on the lined page inside the book. It was about a five minute process that was fascinating as a four-year-old in pigtails and overalls. Today, when I visited the small neighborhood library in Fairfield, California, the friendly librarians like Grandma Barry were no more. Instead, there were automated checkout machines.

So simple, even little kids were using the machines. Scan the barcodes on your library card and books, and you’re done. I checked out “Caramelo” by Sandra Cisneros, “Chocolat” by Joanne Harris and “Animal Dreams” by Barbara Kingsolver, in about 30 seconds flat. Boy would Grandma Barry get a kick out of that!

Here’s an example of the library scanner I used as seen at the San Jose Public Library, from their Flickr Photo Stream.

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