The best candy shop

Maya Angelou

"The best candy shop a child can be left alone in is the library." So said author Maya Angelou.

A memory that sticks with me through the decades is of a mother, a woman I knew, walking into a public library with her three children and carrying a large box full of books. While she fed the books into the book return, she released her children to find new books. Now and then a child would return with an armload of books and deposit them in the box, then go back to look for more books. Soon enough the box was full again, and the family left for home.

Years later, one of these children, a classmate of my son, became the class valedictorian. No surprise there.

To this family, the library truly was the "best candy shop" in the sense Maya Angelou spoke about. These children could take anything they wanted and all they wanted. They chose books galore to satisfy their own individual sweet tooth. They did not get fat. They got smart.