Ms. Pat’s ‘Tiny Library’ is her living legacy

When “Ms. Pat’s Tiny Library” went up in St. Rose on May 20, it was the heartwarming highlight of Patricia Moulin’s memorial and 91 years of living.

“She was a joy,” said Moulin’s daughter, Nonney Oddlokken.

“We were all moved by how incredibly open minded she was. She grew up at the height of racism, but never had a racist bone in her body. She never saw gender or sexuality as anything more than just to embrace the differences in people.”

Moulin was born in 1925 in New Orleans, just five years after women got the right to vote. She voted for Hillary Clinton for president last year.

On May 2, she died suddenly.

“When the call came, I was told she was having a medical emergency and was going to St. Charles Parish Hospital,” Oddlokken said.

Minutes later, another call came to say her mother was gone.

Moulin had been living with Oddlokken’s family for nearly 12 years since she lost everything in Hurricane Katrina. It was going to be a play-it-by-ear thing at first, but it became a good fit, so when they moved to St. Rose, her mother came with them.

Oddlokken decided it would be more personal to have a memorial for her in their artsy, eclectic backyard in St. Rose.

And, from there, they went to the corner of the yard where they had built a memorial to her also known as a “tiny library” where children’s books would be provided to any child who wanted one.

The premise is a child can take book but should also replace it to ensure there are always books available at no charge, and the concept has become a trend nationally, as well as in St. Rose.

It was a fitting memorial for a woman that Oddlokken said loved books and learning.

“Books change lives and giving me so many books changed mine,” she said. “It gave me the notion to travel. I’m super big on literacy.”

Oddlokken said her mother always found the money to keep a book in her hand or got her books at the library.

At age 9, Oddlokken was reading historical biographies and more that helped her go far past her own poverty growing up. As the youngest child of four siblings, life was often challenging.

“That really propelled me from a really bad situation,” she said. “We were poor and the books made me see life was bigger than my world.”

They also made her an adventurer, traveling the world and eventually meeting her husband, Ole, in art school in Oslo, Norway.

Although Moulin has been born poor in the Depression and one of 11 kids with a sixth grade education, Oddlokken remembered her mother as someone who had “a spirit about her that was embracing to all.”

In the 1930s and 1940s, Moulin was a waitress at the K&B on Canal Street and she was a woman who “literally walked the walk” when she welcomed African-Americans to the restaurant counter. She said her mother equally welcomed New Orleans’ drag queens, often commenting on how beautiful they were.

“She believed this stuff,” said an inspired Oddlokken. “She just wanted to find joy in life. She didn’t draw on the past. Probably Zen masters could take a cue from this moment as far as living in the moment.”

So when Moulin died, Oddlokken wanted to memorialize her in a very special, living way.

When they started talking about the little library, her son, who is into robotics at Destrehan High School, and husband built the actual structure that has become the library that stands at the corner of their yard.

Oddlokken along with her husband Ole, a musician, and their two children, Anais and Aidan, decorated it in festive colors and added butterflies around it to make it more inviting, and later added a decal saying, “Ms. Pat’s Tiny Library” with a tiny bird on it. They added a bench next to it, and they have been watching children sitting on it and reading books.

Ms. Pat’s Tiny Library has a Facebook page, offering more information about the project.

“I was so proud when I first saw it,” she said. “The reaction from the neighborhood was overwhelming. People pulled up and told us it was so amazing and made the area like a community.”

Oddlokken said it has brought back warm memories.

“I just wanted a place for kids to have a book in my mom’s memory because they changed my life so much,” she said. “I thought, ‘Look here, mom, this is for you and thank you for all you’ve done for me.’”

 

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