The Slow Medical Drama that is Requesting a Physical Library Book

I do not watch The Pitt. I do not follow other medical dramas. I live them, vicariously and very, very slowly, through the borrowing of physical books from my local public library.

I will read something. A book. A column about books. Or perhaps someone will mention a book. My interest perks up, and I will reach for the public library app and search for that book. Perhaps fifty percent of the time the library has a physical copy, and I will place it on hold.

There's a slow excitement as the weeks tick by. I was number 129 for The Devils for much of 2025. Oh but how my excitement rose when that shifted into double digits in the first third of 2026. 

Next comes the faster excitement when the book moves from "Not ready" to "In transit." Once the physical book is in that part of the hold, I amuse myself by clicking "Check location availability" to see where the book is.

Most of that time it says, "CHECKED OUT". I can relate to that. I have been checked out of one thing or another for many years. 

Some times it says "TRANSIT HOLD" and I am enamoured of the mystery behind that phrase. Is the book in motion, moving from one location to another? Is the book pinned in one place, held? Quantum states and both at the same time? The more I stare at that phrase the more I assume I resemble Heisenberg's Uncertain Library Patron. I'm both waiting patiently for the book to move to me yet I am affecting its motion by observing it.

Today I learned of two additional status states that physical book might be in. I did not take screen captures of all of them. I wish I had. That would have added depth and verisimilitude to this post. I swear, though, that one book briefly provided its location as my local branch of the public library in my city. 

The next day, though, today, that switched to WORKROOM.

I don't like doing work. I am much better at doing play. The notion that this book, or any book, had a room devoted to work interested me, though. So while I was in my local branch I pestered one of the many very, very patient staff who put up with me.

I understand WORKROOM is where a book is placed when it needs some attention. A cut or a tear, perhaps. A bruised cover. A damaged spine.

I understood immediately. Physical books, like physical people, need physical attention. They need doctoring once in a while. WORKROOM is library speak for "this book is in the ER. We're going to try to save its life, as best as we can."

I nodded as this was explained to me, and returned to the waiting area where civilians must pace while the librarians work to repair the damage this cruel, harsh world inflicts on books. Oh, and people. But mostly books.

Hours later I cried. I have learned of a new status:

The book did not make it. DISCARD is a polite way of saying the book has been sent to the book morgue. Gone, leaving me to my lonely unfulfilled broken heart. It is my hope that the librarians may do a full autopsy and discover why this book died. 

I'm a realist, though, and I know that budget cuts and time constraints mean that sometimes we civilians will never learn what specifically sent this book to the afterlife. All we are left with afterwards is that final status of TRACE, vague and undefined, unknowable, un-located. The physical book has given up the ghost, and the only thing left are the moans and that haunting look from patrons who never got those final three weeks to read the book, then say goodbye.