The Reading Room

This morning I discovered a small library in the bottom level of the Maeser building–which may be the oldest, most stately building on the BYU campus.  As I browsed the titles on the shelves and basked in the undisturbed silence, a peculiar emotion came over me. Actually, I felt like what Frank Sinatra sang in an old jazz standard:

                                                                                                 

“I saw you last night and got that old feeling;
When you came in sight I got that old feeling.
The moment that you passed by I felt a thrill,
And when you caught my eye my heart stood still.” ¹

I mean this in all seriousness, as silly as it may sound. (Emotions are a vital, if sometimes dramatic, part of who we are.)  Yeah, I’ll concede that it’s weird to apply these words to a secluded basement library; I’m sure that eventually I’ll be applying it to a special girl yet to be determined…but that’s not today’s subject.

Anyway, the business, history, statistics, and other classes I’ve been taking are great, and have an important place in this world.  But there’s something I love about good poetry, writing, art, and philosophy–something I was reminded of when I stepped into the reading room and saw books by Whitman, Sophocles, etc.  David O McKay called the literary greats the “minor prophets”–and he would know.  ² They’re observers and articulators of life.  I like to bask in that centuries-old atmosphere of liberal commentary.  I like to fellowship with the ideas and feelings they crafted and see the world with a little more resolution.

Here’s an interesting addition: a later line in that song is,
                 

“There’ll be no new romance for me,

  It’s foolish to start,

  While that old feeling is still in my heart.”

No major I’ve investigated yet is as exciting to me as the anticipation of diving into that library.  But majors like business or pre-law are so employable and practical.  Eventually I’ll have a family to provide for, too.  I’m glad I don’t have to commit to one or the other yet.  Whichever I choose, now that I’ve found the reading room I have a nice place to go for occasional solitude and refocusing.

Notes

1. “That Old Feeling” music by Lew Brown, lyrics by Sammy Fain, published in 1937

2. Douglas Callister, “Our Refined Heavenly Home”, Ensign, June 2009