Zoning The Library

Published March 6, 2007

By Kurt Weiss

Why is that when I am supposed the most studious, I am actually the horniest? Something about the library makes me horny – my book is far less interesting to study than the cute girl over by the window. The library can do strange things to people.

In the library, it’s all about getting in the zone. And everyone has their own specific recipe for doing that. For many, it’s the third floor – the quiet floor. Talking is strictly prohibited on the third floor and there’s always someone ready to snap at the next abstract noise from the heater or that girl who clearly does not belong on the third floor and lets her cell phone ring yet again as “ Fergilicious” booms across the silence.

For others, looking for the third floor’s version of a casual Friday, there’s the second floor. Here, silence is implied, though if you break it no one will shush you or cast an icy stare; though, I might decide to stop working and listen in on your conversation. I don’t ever recall being shushed on the second floor. An appropriate response to such an affront would be, “Chill out, bro. Go to the third floor or pull that stick out of your…” And we’d both be right. That’s the beauty of the second floor, a jungle mentality where the strongest beast decides the volume of its kingdom.

The first floor is the seedy underbelly of the library. If you live in a city or simply have an affinity for public transportation, the first floor is definitely the place for you. The first floor offers a constant flow of traffic from tour groups, e-mail checkers, coffee drinkers, in between class idlers, last-minute printers, walk-ins and people with serious work who can’t handle the intensity of the third floor. It’s really something special.

Over the course of my college career, I’ve come to realize I have no zone. It doesn’t matter which floor I choose, eventually and often quickly, my attention will take drastic turns from my work. I get horny on every level of the library. I stare into space. I pick my nose. I walk to the bathroom to look in the mirror. I wonder if the people around me will smell it if I fart. I walk around the library to spread my fart around, in hopes that no one will know it was mine. I play incessantly with my hair. I realize that that fart was a sign that I need to go to the bathroom in the basement – the one that no one knows about and no one uses, but smells like people know about and use it. I get horny.

There’s really no telling how little I’ll accomplish at the library. I’m lucky if I manage to read more than twenty pages in an hour. My work-put-in to hours-clocked ratio is astounding. But I still feel the pressure. In college, every hour gone by is a reminder of a looming deadline. Every time you get up for a drink of water you can hear that clock from 24 tick away as we head to commercial break. There’s never enough time in the day to get it all done. And until that last nuclear bomb is about to blow up somewhere in greater Los Angeles, the Jack Bauer within us all is compromised by an unmotivated nymphomaniac, picking his nose and farting on third floor when his cell phone goes off.

And therein lies the allure of the library. To head to the library is a declaration of studious intent. Once inside however, it’s up to each of us to navigate our own aimless wanderings and erotic fantasies and to decide whether or not we really set out to accomplish anything at all.

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