I think I must have been something like...

I think I must have been something like... Seven years old when I first got a library card.

And I remember being really quite impressed with that,

because there were so many cards that people who were older than me had, bank cards, ID cards.

I think I saw the idea of having your own card for something as being quite a mature thing to be doing.

And so, getting a library card definitely made me feel grown up.

I especially liked the fact that they made you sign the back of it, because I, even at that age, knew that that was something that was done on bank cards.

So again, it made me feel quite grown up.

It also forced me to come up with a signature,

which is something I'd not yet thought about at the age of seven.

And funnily enough, the signature that I invented at the time is the signature that I still have today,

although with a few changes and amendments, I guess you could say it evolved over time.

I got that library card at my local library.

And the place where I grew up, which was a little way off, although not too far in the grand

scheme of things.

About a 35 minute walk into town.

And it wasn't a huge library.

It stood on one floor.

And I remember had a very distinctive and pungent smell of old books.

I think this is when my love of curious books first started developing.

Because as a child, going to the library,

you are very much encouraged to go to the children's section and peruse the literature supposedly meant for you.

...