One of the great pleasures in my life is discovering wonderful things, and then realizing that so many people were ahead of me. Maria and I were driving through Arlington, Vt., yesterday after stopping for breakfast and we came across a beautiful and somewhat mystical box on the side of the road which said it was part of the Little Free Library.Org movement.

You take a book and return a book, and it’s free.

Maria took a book called “Goddesses In Older Women,” an idea that has often been a part of her art. She will bring another book back.

I went on the non-profit group’s website and learned that more than 50,000 people all over the country have set up their free library boxes and stocked them with books that people can read for free, and then replace.

There are a lot of ugly things about social media, but there are a lot of beautiful things about it as well, the trick is to pick and choose, I think.

I wrote about this encounter Sunday on the blog.

Here, the idea of sharing good books with people one-on-one, person-to-person,  is an intimate, community driven and even revolutionary idea. You can buy a library box and ground pole or build one or hire an artist or carpenter to help. You are asked to register ($43) so that people know where you are.

I was further surprised by the more than 70 posts on my blog’s Facebook Page that appeared immediately, many sharing photos of the free library boxes in their communities. I noticed that many of these posts came from rural areas, but they also came from almost every part of the country.

Many were from the Pacific Northwest, or the deep South.

Even though I had not heard of it, it seems to be spreading like wildfire, and it is a great example of how grass-roots organizing, fueled by social media, can spread powerful new ideas below the radar of what we call mass media and politics. Journalism and government have absolutely nothing to do with the Little Free Library movement and don’t even seem to be aware of it. Yet it is everywhere and growing rapidly.

The story of the little free libraries are a story of America at its best and worst. The first little free library was created in Wisconsin in 2009 by a man who wished to honor his mother.

They grew rapidly, but like everything in America, became controversial. Some people thought they were ugly and sought zoning ordinances to limit or remove them, others complained they were “unattached” structures and should be taxed or outlawed. Some people complained that they were unsightly, not fit for upscale neighborhoods.

Despite those occasional conflicts, the movement has grown rapidly and steadily.

It was especially interesting that Maria found this goddess, subtitled “becoming a juicy crone.”

The idea of the “crone” is important in the history of women and feminism. Once it meant a wise goddess, when the major religions – Judaism, Christianity, and the Muslim faith emerged – men dominated conventional religion, and the term evolved into something derogatory. The crone became an evil, old, shriveled up witch.

Many of Maria’s works and images have focused on the emergence of Goddesses and their importance in women finding their voices. Maria says she is a juicy old crone, by which she means anything but shriveled up or  barren of spirit and life. Crones are not witches, they are empowered women.

How fitting it seemed to both of us that this was the book she spotted in the free library box on a roadside, the book that reflects so much of her work, the book she took home.

We agreed that we will join this group, we’ll look around for an appropriate cabinet, if we don’t find one, we’ll buy one on the littlefreelibrary.org site. We’ll probably buy a pole to stick it in the ground. We would love to have one out by the road in front of Bedlam Farm. From all of the posts, I gather that it takes awhile for people to get used to the idea, especially in areas where the idea is new.

It fits us perfectly.  It would be great to have people pull over and take a book, and then come back and leave one. We have plenty to offer ourselves. I’ll be happy to share the experience, I love the grass roots movements springing up all over America, from politics to books. To me, it speaks to a rebirth and re-invention of our democracy. Many of us are committing to it all over again, sometimes, we forget just what it means.

I would be greatly pleased if the people reading this who have these boxes would put up photographs of them on my Facebook Page today.

The piece yesterday clearly struck a deep nerve, and I am pleased to learn about this idea, it is good for us. This is about books, but also something more than that. Something even deeper.

Thanks for reading and sharing.