Lately my friend Ro and I have been hitting up the SMU main library for a couple of hours every night (They kick us out at 9pm because we can't show a college ID to prove we are students... just the creepy old people who don't have a life). She is finishing up her final research project for Children's Medical Hospital and I am studying for my LEED licensing (new item on the 27th year bucket list).
On our way to the library last night, Ro mentioned how much she hated the anxiety and stress that accompanies that smell that lets you know you are in a library. The race against the clock, the feeling of frustration, the absolute solitude and the effect a pen drop can make on the entire floor. Needless to say, she wasn't excited about going, but knew productivity needed to be at it's highest.
As for me, I'm the total opposite. I love that library smell. It takes me back to easier days: college. It gives me a sense of potential, just being there meant there was a possibility to learn something new. I wouldn't say I was a library rat, but I didn't shy away from it either. I lived off campus for 3 of my 4 years, so the library was an easy place to go during open time between classes. I studied there, I read, I socialized, I even slept in the big over sized chairs on the 5th floor. I knew the places to go if I really needed to get something done, but I also knew the places to go if I wanted to run into someone I knew. Needless to say, it was a familiar place.
Now, even though SMU is not OSU (there are very few similarities actually) it still has that same smell. The smell that means something different to all of us, but the smell never changes.
