Among the colorful assortment of lost water bottles and long forgotten notebooks and sweatshirts that have become typical of the Olin-Chalmers Library lost & found box are hidden gems that provide a glimpse into the psyche of the Kenyon College student. At other schools in this great nation of ours, to see an abandoned computer or backpack in the library sends up red flags immediately: that person’s stuff is about to get stolen. At Kenyon, not so much. We pride ourselves on being a trusting and honest campus and are secure enough in our surroundings to leave our MacBooks in the library unattended for hours on end – mostly because 99% of the campus also has a MacBook. As current employees of library here at Kenyon, we’d like to share a few of our all-time favorite finds among the stacks and behind the desk.
- A Single Shoe: It’s more common than you may think. They appear wedged in between books on a shelf in the science & math section or sitting on a table in the middle of the third floor. The main questions we have concerning the discovery of a single shoe are: A) How did you manage to leave one, and not the other? (disregard if you are an amputee) and B) What is the rationale behind leaving it in the middle of stacks? Are you really so frustrated or stressed that the only logical response is to subject countless calculus textbooks to what can only be described as an odor of week old Natty Light and some sort of cheese?
- A Diary: We understand that keeping a running record of everything that happens to you is critical, but do you really need it on you when you’re searching for a book? Were you planning on doing a quick entry between your Good Nukes, Bad Nukes homework and searching for a source on marriage in Jane Austen’s novels? All we know is that we would not want to leave something lying around that, hypothetically of course – we know it breaks girl code to read another’s diary, accounts every detail of your dance floor make-out and subsequent dance floor puke-sesh from Friday night. Again, hypothetically, if we did sneak a peak, we agree that “Jessica” is a total b-word who’s after your man. Lock it up ladies.
- A Belt: Again, so many questions. What constituted you needing to take your belt off completely? We understand the classic unbuckle after too much Kung Pao Chicken at Peirce, but the full removal is a new chapter to this belt saga. We’re also not naïve enough to assume that people don’t get a little frisky on their study breaks in the library, but come one people that’s what carrels are for. And to whoever owns this belt, man or woman up and come get it already.
- A Scorpion Shaped Door Stop: There are no words. We’ll let you try and figure this one out.