The Ninth Circle

A little girl died this weekend. She was going to school in another town, but she had been attending our school for several years previously. The compassionate, good-hearted people at my school had seen an ugly situation brewing and taken steps to have her removed from her home and placed in foster care. But the system didn't work for her. They put her back with her family. And, so they could escape the people who were trying to help her, they moved to another town, another school.

She was a quiet, shy, sweet little girl with blond hair and glasses. I never saw the bruises. I never knew. There will be an autopsy and an investigation. But they are pretty sure her dad killed her.

There was another child killed recently. A little, two-year old was left in the snow by a dad who was supposed to take care of her. My heart broke in two when I read that there were tiny footprints in the snow which showed she had walked around before she died. That was bad.

But, in a way, this is worse because I knew this child. She had been in my library. She had listened to the stories I read. I KNEW her.

In Dante's Inferno, there were nine circles of hell, each circle getting progressively worse until the ninth circle was reached. This is where those people who hurt children should be bound and hurt, again and again and again.

She was only ten years old.

This is Why

I just made myself cry reading a book aloud to some of my students. It was "The Miraculous Journey of Edward Tulane", by Kate Dicamillo, and if you haven't read it, YOU SHOULD.

I like many components of my job as a library media specialist in an elementary school.

I love the whole technology component, much of which didn't even exist when I started working as a librarian back in the stone age. Even checking out books using a computer was just a glimmer in some future-thinking librarian's eye back then. Web pages? (What's an Internet?) Projectors hooked to a computer that sat on your desk? Blogs? Wikis? Spam? Even email was actually called Electronic Mail at first and we were all intimidated by the very idea of sending mail on the computer.

I love working with kids. I love that ah-ha moment that occurs with them every now and then, that spark which ignites a love of reading, that connection when you match them with just the right book.

I love books. All kind of books. Kid's books. Grown-up books. books of every genre. I love to look at them, to smell them, to feel them, to read them. And when I get a new book order? And I can open all the boxes and spread them out and pick ANY ONE I WANT to read? That's better than Christmas and my birthday combined.

I love working with truly dedicated teachers who care about what they are doing and know it is the most important job in the world. And show it every single day.

But the best part. The very best part. Is reading a really good book to the kids.

I love to make them laugh out loud with delight. I love to make them put their hand over their mouth in suspense. I love to make them so involved in the story that they sit mesmerized, spellbound, in the thrall of the tale. And I like to make them sad. That may sound cruel. But I like to make them think, make them talk, make them appreciate what they have, make them put themselves into someone else's life for an instant.

I don't often cry when I read to them. But it was a small group. We were totally into Edward's adventures. It was the end of the book and he was in the doll shop when someone came in to choose him. I could tell a couple of the students guessed what was going to happen because they leaned forward, obviously excited. I shook my head at them not to tell the others. When I finished the last sentence, my eyes filled with tears. The kids sat silently thinking. One of the girls leaned forward spontaneously and put her hand on my knee in kindred sympathy and shared joy.

This is why I am a librarian. This moment.