Toronto woman to visit 100 library branches, walk 300 km in honour of her late mom
· Toronto Sun
Marci Stepak says she’s walking 300 kilometres to all 100 branches of the Toronto Public Library between April 7-16 as “a love letter” to her late mother, and the TPL.
Visit palladian.co.za for more information.
Stepak’s mom, Eunice, died from cancer the day before turning age 88 on April 7, 2025, and her love of the library remained until just a few days before her death when she reminded her daughter, 55, to return her books so that “someone else can enjoy them.”
“We grew up in the Jane and Finch area so our local library was called York Woods Branch, so she just would take me there every week for story hour,” said Stepak, who moved back to Toronto to take care of her mother after almost two decades of living in Quebec.
“Probably as an excuse to drop me off so she could go smoke Rothmans cigarettes in the parking lot. And then when I got older, she would take me around Toronto to discover the used book shops and different library branches. It was our through line. Our love language was reading, swapping books with each other. And it all started at the library.”
Stepak’s children, aged 23 and 25, are coming in from Quebec to join her for part of the trek with their partners, along with her aunt and uncle.
Her own partner will act as Stepak’s crew, keeping her hydrated and fed, and drop her off and pick her up at the various library stops each day and they will occasionally joined by her Husky-Labrador named Tess.
Stepak encourages strangers to join her on part of her walk
She’ll average 30 kilometres a day, starting the 10-day walk at the York Woods library branch and ending at the Toronto Reference Library, and encourages others to join her or follow her journey on Instagram where she’ll be posting daily on @beingmarci.
She has been training— she walked 180 km hike in Tobermory, Ont., last summer and has been working with physiotherapists on things like ankle strength — but expects to be sweating a lot.
“I actually want this to be hard,” she said. “I needed somewhere for all this grief to go and I couldn’t control any of the grief but this is something I can arrange so I chose to do it in 10 days to get it done. And it’s going to be a great way to rediscover the city ‘cause there’s pockets of Scarborough I’ve never been to and parts of Etobicoke I’ve never been to.”
In terms of what happens as she visits each Toronto library, there will be no ceremony as such, but she will get her library passport (both paper and the digital versions) stamped at those branches that can accommodate.
“The Toronto Library Foundation has shared my walk with their community, which is obviously a lot of librarians,” said Stepak. “And so a lot of librarians have reached out to me saying, ‘Hey, we’ve got our stamp ready.’ Or ‘Let me know when you’re coming in, I’ll walk a portion with you.” Or we want to take your picture.’ So I wouldn’t call it a ceremony but I think there’s going to be lots of fun conversations with the librarians.”
Stepak, who’s a content strategist (writer) for Heart and Stroke, is also fundraising for TPL with a goal of $5,000 and encourages donations through @beingmarci that has a donate button.
“For me the fact that I haven’t even started this walk yet and people have been reaching out, that type of connection has been the best part of this walk,” she said. “It obviously makes me feel less alone.”