The dollhouse

Author's Note: The following piece was written for a creative writing class I am taking this summer. The instructor asked us to write about libraries. And this was the first thing that came to my mind. I think it's pretty cool, and if you grew up in Ridgewood or ever went to the Ridgewood library, you'll probably know what I'm talking about. And by the way, the picture is not of me. Enjoy!

It was the dollhouse she liked the best, tucked in the back corner of the children’s room, always in the same spot regardless of how the library shelves shifted around it. She had to stand on a stool to look inside it, but it was worth it, every time.

The yellow striped wallpaper and the green couches in the family room reminded her of grandma’s house, of warmth and coziness and plush rugs that tickled your toes if you ran across them barefoot.

And in the kitchen, there it was, that Thanksgiving turkey, tiny yet just as glistening and plump as the one she watched Dad carve each year, also perched up on a stool, waiting to someday be tall enough.

And as she traced her fingers up the miniature stairs, carpeted in pink, she thought about the family that lived there, how happy they must be, how truly content in their home.

Books could carry her to other places, she knew, and she loved them for it. She would spend a lifetime devouring stories for that reason alone, and even at five, she was sure that a love of reading was in her future. But before she selected her book, she always had to visit the dollhouse. It was the best part of the library. And when she looked inside it, her little nose pressed against the glass, it was like traveling to the greatest dreamland ever.

Inside that dollhouse lay a place far more accessible than the faraway lands of fiction. And for that, it was the best part of the library.