Yesterday I ran into a student in one of the offices at school. I haven’t seen her in a while and as we chatted, she said she was busy with after school activities, but that she was still reading but missed being in the library.

Over the weekend, I bought a gift card for a local convenience store to give to a student from us in the library to recognize her participation in our #ReadLikeAFalcon Day during testing week in which she came in and spent the ENTIRE DAY drinking hot chocolate and reading. We expected students to come in for an hour or two, but not the entire day. She didn’t need the gift card, the reward of reading all day was gift enough.

Last week, I talked on the phone with a former student (it’s been over a decade, so I should probably stop referring to her in this way) who I occasionally meet for tea and conversation about life and books but whose distance makes it easier now to catch up over the phone. Where did we end our conversation? What we’ve been reading. We started the conversation talking about a podcast she told me to listen to about libraries.

Cheers to the readers, near and far.