Next Tuesday the latest opening of a refurbished Carnegie library takes place in downtown Fergus.
Despite the acrimony associated with its construction and redevelopment, it is here and ready to be used by patrons of the Wellington County library system.
Visitors will be greeted with a quality project that matches the old and new with a sense of charm and warmth that is synonymous with most endeavors the county undertakes. Significant effort in the construction is taken to preserve heritage elements and expand on those themes with complementary materials. It remains our opinion that anything worth doing is worth doing well.
The literary world continues to adapt to change. This facility will offer those advantages as well as honour the tradition of the printed word – a trend that seems to be catching on again. For the first time, slippage has been noted with ebook sales. It could well be that the prospect of “staring into a flashlight” as one speaker we heard at a publisher’s convention put it, has had its day.
There remains something special about a book that hasn’t been replicated. The tactile feel of book stock, whether leather bound, hard bound or a paperback, seems to us to be part of the experience. Sure, most digital platforms have a nice sound as if a page were turning, but the weight and feel are far different.
For our own personal tastes, when ensconced in a good read, whether it is fiction or non-fiction, the chance for the imagination to take off is at its best with a book.
Dramatic tales where the mind draws on the author’s words to create a mental image or even a business book that might have a suggestion or thought that can be applied to a current business issue, real books give time to digest what is being said. There is no pause button per se, nor an overload of sight and sound based on what a director thinks you should think. A book gives time, which leaves it in the reader’s hands to decide how much time to give to pursue ideas.
It was the hope of many who pushed for the development of this site into its current library form that it would be a place of learning and community togetherness. We hope so too – there is no better time to start than at an opening.
