The library

The house of my childhood had a library that occupied an entire wall.

A wooden body that held a universe of books, strange to a child. At that time, it was exclusively my mother’s territory. I did not see books or libraries in the homes of my friends. Perhaps that is why it struck me as a significant detail, one that offered me a different vision of my family.

When my mother passed away, I took from that childhood home only a few books from her library. I wanted nothing else from a place that was no longer mine, but I did want some of those books that still stirred a sense of childhood pride. Today, those paper bodies, together with others made of wood, such as fish, guitars, and Trojan horses, inhabit my own library. Mine is different from my mother’s, yet equally treasured, filled with objects that belong to different moments of my life and that stand as silent witnesses to the passage of a life.

Even today, I continue to look at those books with the same childlike curiosity and wonder. They live on that white library shelf and, in one way or another, they remind me of my mother.