This is not a heading designed to open up some glib reference to the Book of Nature, but - as plenty of you will recognize from this image - a celebration of getting back into the Huntington. Over the past far-too-many years, it's been far too rare a thing to get there: Covid, of course, but before and after that, the endless demands of chairing and being DGS, and despite my avowed intent to clear a weekly library and research day, that happened more in theory than in practice. But now that I'm on leave, I can head over very easily to my very favorite library ... or rather, what would be my favorite library if it wasn't currently undergoing so much reconstruction and earthquake retrofitting and the like that the benefits of being able to access what I need on open shelves aren't, alas, available. However, the sheer pleasure of working in uninterrupted quiet was there; as was the pleasure of coming outside at the end of the working day and seeing flowering trees and mountains; as was this further pleasurable treat of a bamboo-filled courtyard on the way to the reading room ...there used to be a second such court, where one could sit and eat one's lunch, but unfortunately this encouraged Rodents, and alas the bamboo in that particular space is no more.
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