Fontana Lewis Library and Technology Center, Fontana, California

After the Bummer of Riverside, I decided to head closer to my AirBNB location and finish my work at the Fontana Lewis Library. What a lovely little surprise.

My first thoughts on Fontana were not positive as it seemed like miles of residential with no commercial or gas stations in sight. Now that I've been there a couple of days, I've found all the Starbucks and shopping enclaves and it is a much more hospitable environment. Fontana is basically a great big suburb about 50 miles from the Los Angeles city center. It has an Applebees.

I really love this AirBNB--the room is new, clean, and nice, I have a key for my door, and while I have to share the bathroom with other AirBNB guests, it hasn't been a problem as yet. Unfortunately, the neighborhood is not quite as nice--oh, don't get me wrong, everyone has a nice house and nice cars...but everyone also has dogs. It's a kennel's worth of dogs, a poundful of dogs, dogs upon dogs upon dogs. When I arrived, the electricity had inexplicably gone out (my hosts were perplexed as it had never happened before) and the whole neighborhood was out in the street, conferring and complaining. Simultaneously, it sounded like a hundred dogs were all barking, too, as the weirdness had not escaped them and, according to my host, it was not usual to have people out in the street talking and exclaiming. Dogs, dogs everywhere...all barking their little butts off.

I was so tired that first night that I just passed out and don't remember anything until 6 a.m. the next morning. I tried sleeping in today (until 8!) but the BIG dog next door made such calamitous noise that it scared me awake and, per usual when I get startled or scared, it pissed me off. So no more sleep for me. Add that to the blasting music the night before and someone incessantly smoking close enough for it to drift into my window and wah, wah, wahhh. Not as nice.

May the Government Documents be with you.

Close the window, you say? HAHAHAHAHAHA. It's been 95-100 degrees since I left Flagstaff, at least during the day. It is HOT as HADES. And it means that I avoid the AirBNB until at least sundown...the night gets pretty cold, but it takes hours and I am well asleep by the time I need any kind of blanket. And I am sure as hell not closing the window while half asleep. Not running the AC despite considerable heat is something I noticed at several of the places I've stayed so far. People are just not eager to turn on the AC. I get it. I keep thinking of that episode of Seinfeld when Jerry and Elaine visit Jerry's parents in Florida and they are dying of the heat but the parents have no idea. What, you want me to turn on the AC? Oh, to be oblivious to temperatures! Anyway, if you want free AC, you gotta go to the library.

Fontana Lewis was great. I sat in the main hall and worked while the sunlight moved through the panes at the opposite end of the building, filtering rainbow colors as it went across the library and patrons. I tried to get a photo but it just shows up as a green dot. It was a nice effect playing out in my peripheral for the latter part of the afternoon.

As you can see from the photos, the building has a grand, arched ceiling made of skylights that extends far above the main floor--the whole place had an airy feel that was warm, calm, and somehow cocooning in that quiet light. If I tire of driving all over creation to see these LA-area libraries, I've already decided to go back to Fontana...it's a lovely library and offers an atmosphere perfect for thinking and writing.

As with so many libraries, the DVD section was all the rage. It is the place you are most likely to see kids sprinting toward with feral, greedy eyes. It reminds me so much of Blockbuster days...remember when? Rolling up to the Blockbuster, checking out the new arrivals--getting one of the last ones left of some Big Movie...perhaps throat punching some many-barretted bobbysockser for that last copy of My Best Friend's Wedding. Good times.

The library isn't quite like that, but aside from people like me trying to find space to study, read, or write at work tables and stations, the DVD section is the Scene. In retrospect, during my flight from Brooklyn and unburdening of 98% of my belongings, it never occurred to me to donate my DVDs to a library...now I feel kind of bad about that. Most went to my mom, but a good 50 or so were just left in the foyer for the neighbors to descend upon. Which they did. But still, it would have been a nice feeling to know those DVDs were being utilized by the community as a whole. Then again, so little of my possessions went anywhere useful.

One last thing: Fontana also had parking. This is a big, big deal in the LA-area library systems. I've already had to abandon one library trip because the parking was too much of a bear and I could not muster the energy to care.

Sorry LA Main Library, you were on my list
But there is a limit to circling before I get pissed
Maybe next time I'm in town we'll get together, or not
I'd love to see your innards and check out whatcha got.

Can you believe I have a Masters' in this shit?

LA Main Library. Pretty, ain't it?

Riverside Public Library, Riverside, California

Betrayal, thy name is Riverside Public Library. Or maybe, Google Images. Either way, what I got was not what I expected.

Here is the screenshot of the googled Riverside Public Library:

See the pretty building? They tore it down in 1964. If you want to see how gorgeous it was, go here. This is what they replaced it with:

Nnnooooooooooooo

ooooooooooooooo

Hot stuff, right? Now, I'm all for 60s architecture. The funkier the better, and bring on the globe lights and nonsensical patterned wall attachments, but how could they? Just. HOW. Could they? Doesn't your whole body just ache looking at those pictures? It is physically painful. So beautiful, smashed to dust.

Main Floor next to the circulation desk.

I do like the current Riverside Public Library. It's just weird and old enough to give the proper willies while serving the public simultaneously. If you can't be beautiful, at least be interesting. I am sure a mean aunt has said that to someone somewhere.

I guess this makes me Riverside's mean aunt?

Anyway, there were three levels and I visited each one trying to figure out where to set up for the long haul. My laptop's battery is pretty good, but I do need to plug in after about 4-5 hours, so outlets are a must. I started out in the basement since that was the only place I could find outlets (and they went full tilt, too, with not just outlets but power strips); it was cold and brightly lit with that green, buzzy fluorescent light that gave so many of us nausea headaches as kids. I personally love this light because it exposes all the corners...you can't possibly have a shadow demon living in such conditions. If anything is going to come for you, it is going to be fully illuminated and in all kinds of trouble for it.

The stacks were basic tan metal and the furniture was bric-a-brac from somewhere in the saddest part of the 80s. I got one of the green comfy chairs (pictured below) and settled in for a good long spell of writing.

The basement

I had almost completed my first blog post when a man slammed two books directly across the table from me, then proceeded to unload a variety of dirty cords from a filthy, overgrown fanny pack of sorts. The smell hit me, and my typing stopped. I debated. Stay or go? It was the sweat/dirt smell (as opposed to the vomit/urine smell) so I decided to see how it went. We can share this space, can we not?

No one has ever been murdered here, probably.

He proceeded to plug in the largest collection of old devices I've seen in one sitting (outside of, you know, frickin Best Buy). Ipods (several generations), phones, other things I could not identify. He grumbled to himself as he did this--it was a process, though if for any value other than the process itself, I couldn't say. I was trying my damndest to stay the course, finish what I had set out to do, and not flee.

I finished up and decided to find another place to sit on a different floor. I remembered seeing women up on the third floor (the basement had filled up with almost entirely men, all charging phones or reading, and me) so went to check it out. It was fine enough to start work on the second blog post, though there was no electricity there--instead, they had a bunch of electrical outlet boxes with no outlets, almost as if to say...we thought about it, but mmmmm nope. After awhile I could smell the bathrooms. That was enough. I stopped and saved the second blog post and headed out.

On my way toward the door I saw these lovely Tiffany-style globes hanging at either side of the exit. I've searched around but can find no explanation for them. They certainly do not match the rest of the mid-60s decor. I imagined they were part of the original, Carnegie-built library...they seem far more 1903 than 1960, no? I could see some librarian fighting like hell to keep one nice reminder of what they had before and this is how these odd lanterns still survive. Of course, this is just conjecture. It's equally possible they were created last year and smacked onto the front as someone's Best Idea for aesthetic improvements.

Riverside was a functional public library with hip flairs here and there, but I couldn't have stayed there all day, anyway, Cordman or no Cordman. I cut the visit short in hopes of finding more amenable accommodations.