ode to libraries (the book ones)
25 Sep, 2025
Most of the audience reading this post think of some random new programming tool dropped recently when the word library comes up. Let’s leave our déformation professionnelle in the door and think about the libraries. Book ones. This post is an ode to them.
I am not sure if libraries work the same way everywhere around the world but in my country they are completely free, you can sit for hours, borrow books, again, for free.
The idea of borrowing something from an institution without owing them anything in this time we’re living in amazes me. I mean who gives you free stuff (except free pain)? This fact itself is enough for me to think libraries are amazing. I consider myself a decent book reader and it’s been a long long time since I had to pay for a book.
But this isn’t the only think I like about my libraries.
So the story begins with me, a remote working software developer getting married to a remote working software developer.
My husband and I are a newly wed couple with all the fun and silliness but life (work) gets in the way naturally. Traditional couples see each other a few hours every day, and usually spend the weekends together to make up the lost time. We don’t have the lost time. We’re together, always. Working in the same room (our home office) resting in the same room etc. and god, we annoy each other. Love only goes so far, folks. Love is great for your daily life, for your home. But what if your home is also your work? And what if your work needs some limits on the PDA?
You can (ideally) leave your work stress and burden when you leave company building. However, when remote working, you’re not leaving work at all and even if unintentionally, that mood rubs off on your partner, who has the same tension from work.
I’ve spent all of my teen years and a couple of my twenties in student dormitories which I had to share my room with at least 4 other girls. That fact alone justifies that I love and need my personal space and time in my home. And my partner also needs that, even if he doesn’t say so, I know he needs. And we respect each other on this and try to leave the house for a couple hours every now and then. Again, any traditional couple may not need this kind of arrangement, one or both of them having to leave for work, but we’re not like the other couples.
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