Library Card

We went to the library today to settle our account.  Returned about 15 items, books and movies, that were all on time.  The problem?  One of the 2 DVDs of a season of Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles has gone missing.  We looked for it for a week.  No go.

So I gave up and went in so they could revoke my library card.  Just kidding.  I paid them $16.99 and we laughed about kids and their uncanny ability to lose things even when we think we know that those things are in a safe, known place.  They let me take the one DVD and the case back home, since I technically just bought it from them.  The kids like "Jinja Turtles," as Teancom calls them, the library needs money to run, and I like the Cincinnati Library A LOT, so everyone wins.

When we were there and she was scanning in my 2 foot pile of items, Elijah grabbed a "library card:"  it was a business card that listed the branch's operating hours.  He said, "Does this let me check out movies?"  I giggled and said it didn't.  "But it's a library card," he insisted.  I paused.  "It's a card, and it's from the library, but it's not a Library Card."  He looked at me like I was crazy, then he looked quizzically at the card in his hand.  "What is it then?"

We continued that conversation trajectory until it ended, I thought, with me telling him that he couldn't take the card home, because I already had one in my wallet.  We were back in the van before I saw the card in his hands.  He saw me see it and said, "I wanted it."  I figured there wasn't much harm in him taking it; that's what they're there for, anyways.  And if they didn't want kids to take one, they wouldn't put it so close to the edge of the counter.

As we drove away from the library Elijah said, "Does this card make me a member of the Church?"  I laughed.  Ah, the power of a card.