I have an absolutely horrible track record returning library books. I have no idea why. Perhaps on some level I just want to keep all the books and hoard them until I have my own library. Whatever the reason, the apple doesn’t fall far from the tree.
Joseph is not only consistently late in returning his books, but it appears as though he’s lost one entirely meaning I get to pay $20 for a book I’ve never seen. The blame doesn’t rest solely with one little first grader. It rests with the craziness that is his life.
While most children may have the book in one of three places: school, home, daycare, Joseph—being the child of divorce—has six places where his books may be: school, home, daycare, dad’s house, grandparent’s house, tutor. So we all tore apart our houses looking for a book about tigers and came up blank.
The only other thing I could think of is that it accidentally got turned in to the town library because, yes, Joseph goes to the library with his dad once a week and with his aunt two times a month. I called the library and spoke to a nice woman who laughed and assured me I wasn’t the first parent to call. Apparently, they have an entire cart of books from school libraries behind their counter. A couple times a month, they take it to the district office for distribution back to the appropriate libraries. Librarians are organized like that.
But our tiger book wasn’t in the cart and she had no recollection of seeing it.
I’ll write a check tomorrow because Joseph’s itching to check out another book. I have no doubt we’ll find the Tiger book in less than a week after. When we do, it had better become Joseph’s favorite book.
Do your children ever misplace library books?
