Sandra Day O'Connor Thank you. That's a great idea. I don't know what could matter more in a community than the library. As all of you probably already know I grew up on a ranch in a very remote part of Arizona, half of the ranch was in New Mexico. The ranch straddled the state line. But the house was physically in Arizona. Most of the road from the highway was in New Mexico. But then it circled back into Arizona and that's where I grew up. We were between Duncan, Arizona, and Lordsburg, New Mexico. About 30 miles from town either way. We didn't go to town often in those days, and the ranch was sparse and dry. You know what the Arizona high desert country is like. And it's full of everything that has teeth or claws or sharp spines -- something to hurt you. And you learned early on to be a little bit careful about where you stepped and walked and rode and how you handled things. That can stand you in good stead through life, I think, is you have to walk through the bramble bushes of life. But my friends in my early years were books. I didn't have siblings until about 10 years after my birth. And my friends were my parents and the cowboys who lived there at the ranch. And books. And I loved to read from early on. It meant so much to me. And that's why I guess I have an affinity for libraries and why the invitation of the Scottsdale public library was a welcome one. I've not had a lot of time to write just for the sake of writing.

My bookshelves in my home are lined with something