Posts by Jyna Scheeren

I spent a recent weekend pondering the existence of God. It’s something I do from time to time because I was a religious person once, in the Judeo/Christian tradition, but am not so now. After many years, I’m still getting used to living without that label. I have to admit, my non-religious years have been very good years.

One interesting documentary that makes a case against the Judeo/Christian God is called The God Who Wasn’t There. It presents the story of

The sound of a Rattlesnake's warning is terrifying and hard to describe. It doesn’t sound like a baby’s toy. Well, it might if the toy was being shaken at a million times per second by an angry, tight-fisted god who looked kind of like a baby. Add to that impossible sound a buzz and a sinister, insistent shhhhhhhhhhh. You may think I’m being dramatic, but in my defense, it’s easy to be dramatic when you’re face to face with a Diamond 

"It's the jokes. I need the jokes."

This is something a young library patron said to me the other day. He wanted me to find him a DVD of Abbott and Costello’s greatest movies and routines.  I felt an instant kinship with the boy, whom I’ll call Hal. “Yes,” I thought as I took to the catalog. “It’s the 

Social Dancing, which consists of various forms of dance, such as

I am a rabid, chronic life-long learner, and I'm starting this column because promoting life-long learning is one of the key components of our mission here at NYPL. Also, I bet there are a lot of people like me out in the world, people who want to know about EVERYTHING.

Whether you take up something new one thing at a time, or scatter your attention on a few things at once, this is your forum. In her book called

The first time I saw the film Koyaanisqatsi I was a college student rambling around on an aimless Saturday night. A campus hall was screening it for free, so I ducked inside, my curiosity piqued.  I remember thinking, “Koyaanisqatsi? What does that mean?” With an “oh well” shrug, I settled into one of the classroom’s half-desk chairs as the lights dimmed to black. When the film ended and the lights shone, I was changed.

Scored with the haunting music of