Change Is Hard

…but change is certain.

Category Archives: library


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It's a new day

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I woke up early this morning, around 5:00 and instantly felt like I had to get to work.  On something, though I wasn’t sure what.   Somehow the  inaugural had seeped into the inner layers of my brain and  I felt like this morning was the beginning of a new chapter.  It’s a new chapter in everyone’s life, and I for one was raring to go.  Of course it’s just as efficient to think about things I could/should do while still reclined under warm covers…so I did.  What can I do to make a difference?  What can I come up with that combines things I love with things that are needed?

I’m still contemplating that as the sun rises in the eastern sky, the air warms and the snow glistens.  It’s going to take some thought, but I need to do something.  If every person found something to do that added to the good of us all…well…that’s almost too exciting to think about!  Sort of like Christmas Eve, when all the presents are under the tree, still wrapped, still untapped potential, and you’re about 8 years old.  Just too much to comprehend as a whole.

So I’m going to work on what I can do.  I’ll leave the contemplation about what all of you can do to you.

The cutest comment I heard last night at the library regarding the Washington events:  “Bush was the only president I’ve know my whole life! I don’t know if I’ll like the new guy.” –  by a little girl about 6 or 7 years old.


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A little bit of this, a little bit of that.

It seemed like a lot going on this weekend, and yet not so much.  Katie and I did agility on Saturday morning, Saturday afternoon I drove through snow to Ann Arbor to attend a concert at the University of Michigan, Sunday morning I drove back home, again in snow, so that I could work at the library Sunday afternoon, and now Monday  I’m enjoying a day off thanks to Martin Luther King, watching inauguration doings on television and cooking stew.

During agility Katie and I practiced a lot on all the different equipment.   She got over her fear of the dogwalk, and loved leaping up and over the A-frame.  She still had problems with the chute, and had to have it held open for her to run through, but she ran through the tunnel no problem and even went over a very high jump that had been left high after a German Shepard had jumped before her.  No problem!  Then we got to the teeter totter which she decided she hated.   The instructor and I worked with her for quite a long time, but only succeeded in making her afraid of the dogwalk and the A-frame again!  Just doesn’t like that yellow paint.  Oh well, we’ll try again next Saturday.

The concert in Ann Arbor was lovely.  It was called a Collage concert, all the departments in the University’s music, dance and drama departments participated.  The stage had either the band or the orchestra in the center, and smaller groups along the edge, the chorus on risers along the back.  What was really cool is that while the spotlight was on a particular group and they were preforming, other groups were coming and going, and as one group ended, the next began, the spotlight moving to them.  It was snippets of music, dance and drama, one right after the other, each piece totally different from the one before.  It moved really fast and was fascinating and wonderful.  At one point lights reflected off the cymbals and threw patterns of moving light on the wall.  For an instant I panicked thinking Katie would start barking at the moving light!  And later I noted that concerts are sort of like agility, except it’s the musicians and dancers all taking cues from the conductor rather than dogs taking cues from their handlers.  This particular concert probably felt more like that because there was such a sense of quick movement between the groups of performers.  It just felt so similar to what I had been doing with Katie earlier in the day, in an odd sort of way. I have to say I loved the four cellos playing Fandango by Jeremy Crosmer, and the group of five saxophones who played The Girl with the Flaxen Hair by Claude Debussy, the dozen or so drummers doing Samba Batucada arranged by Sissauyhoat; but my favorite turned out to be the full orchestra playing Nimrod from Enigma Variations by Edward Elgar.  It just made my heart swell and float away it was so beautiful.

Working at the library Sunday was fun as well, I was at a different location than I had ever worked before, so there was the usual questions from me as to where stuff was.  But this particular library had patrons that checked out books!  Real books!  Of course there were also the movies and music going out the door, but a big percentage of the stuff heading out were books!  I was elated and the time flew by.  Once home I realized I was tired, I’d been on my feet nearly the whole time because it was such a busy branch.

And today, Katie is wound up, needing attention as I try to watch news from Washington.  We went outside a bunch of times, but Katie wasn’t happy to be in her plowed out walkway.  The snow is up to her shoulders now, we got 5 or 6 more inches of snow over the weekend.  She wanted to go PLAY in the snow.

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So we did.  I put the long leash on her and the high boots on me and we went out in the back yard to play.  She loved running and leaping in the snow, and we only came in because my fingers were freezing.  Hard to try taking pictures of her while running and trying not to fall in the knee deep snow yourself!

It’s a wonderful, optimistic time for all of us.  Katie is grateful for the run.  I’m grateful for the hope I see coming from Washington.  Maybe we’ve hit the bottom; the bottom of the winter, the bottom of the economic downturn…maybe we’re headed back up into the light.

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Reevaluating assumptions

Last night at the library I was struck by a learning moment…for me. A young man, perhaps 9 or 10, stopped by the desk, and in a soft voice asked me if we had Beethoven. I started looking through the catalog for the movie about the big dog. Not seeing it, I asked the other librarian if she had seen it, totally ignoring the soft voice saying he wanted Beethoven on a CD. Eventually (and I have to say a bit ashamedly not quickly) his voice wound its way into my brain. He wanted a CD. Music, not the movie. He wanted Beethoven music.

He had been listening to some Beethoven on one of our computers and he wanted to know if we had the CD.  While we searched the CD shelves I asked if he played an instrument. He said no. I asked if he was was working on a project about Beethoven at school. He said no. Turns out he just likes listening to it. He left with one CD and ordered three more to be sent from another branch. Mostly piano concertos, a couple done with violin.

After he left I sat myself down and knocked myself up the side of the head. Because of his age I had leaped to the assumption that he wanted a movie about a dog. Even with added evidence, him softly clarifying that he wanted a CD not a DVD, I stayed with what I thought was the truth far beyond when I should have been listening to him. It’s a lesson I’ve had to learn before, and apparently I needed to learn once again. You can’t tell what a person is interested in based on the way they look.

Really.


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Looking for hope

The library system where I work is a conglomeration of small libraries in small towns within a county that has always been heavily industrial. Mostly General Motors. Its a county I used to live and work in more than 15 years ago, and it was already struggling back then. Given the economic climate now the area is pretty devastated. Today I worked in a branch out in one of the small communities and much of the talk among patrons, overheard by me, was about job loss, the decline of housing prices, and fears for the future. Where to find health insurance, which employer closed last week, who is rumored to close next week. Who’s already out of work, who is likely to be out of work on Monday, who’s had interviews, and where.

Though the patrons smile at me as they check out their DVDs, CDs and books, the smiles are thin and don’t reach their eyes.  The faces are tired, hopeless, frightened.  People who were always able to take care of themselves are searching for anything, any kind of work, to feed their families now.  It made me feel guilty to be working, especially as I am now someone from outside their community.  I stay quiet, scan stuff in and out, try to make myself  less noticible.  Kind of hunkering down, which is what many people said they were going to do as they try to survive the next few months…or years.

As I drove the forty miles home tonight there was a beautiful sunset, all golden and orange streaks with big blocks of pink, purple and navy.  It was a sunset my mother would have taken a picture of, and it was just about the only beautiful thing I’d seen or heard all day.  While I’m glad the library is there, to give people  resources and a place to meet other people to talk and vent,  I wish there was more I could do.  And I feel guilty about hoping my husband and I don’t find ourselves in the same boat soon.

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It's a brand new year!

The first day of 2009 dawned a delicate pink here in Michigan. Fresh snow on the ground, clear skies and the sun coming up make for a hopeful feeling. Katie and I watched the sun rise as we wandered the yard looking for the perfect place. If you know what I mean.
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Traditionally this is the time to plan future goals.  So here are a few things I hope for in the year 2009:

That my family members find peace and resolution to their current troubles.

That I find a full time library job.

That Katie gets to take some more agility classes.

That the economy finds its bottom and begins to improve.

That the Middle East finds some sort of structured peace (hey if you’re wishing might as well wish big!)

That all of you are safe and happy.

Love to all, from Katie and me.

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Taking the library to where the people are

Today I worked at a branch of the library that is located inside the town’s major mall.  It’s down near Sears, with a steady stream of people walking by and  I could hear the mall Christmas music playing as I worked.  During my five hour shift the mall walkers stopped in after their workouts to read the local paper and chat in comfortable groups, and lots of people ducked in for a quick check of emails on  our internet computers.  At least three husbands were there reading while their wives shopped, and I noticed a couple of  male teens  reading and rocking in comfortable rocking chairs back by the teen fiction section.  Lots of people were looking at the DVDs as well, but I checked a lot of books out which always makes me smile.

All in all I think it’s a pretty successful branch, an example of putting the library where the people are; making it accessible while they’re doing their everyday stuff,  rather than making a visit to the library a special trip that  all too often is put off until another day.  It’s proof that if you build a beautiful, functional, convenient space, people will come.


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Library funny

Yesterday afternoon I was working at the library.  Though you wouldn’t think it takes a masters degree to do it, a large part of my job seems to be checking dvds in and out.  Families come in and each member brings back the maximum, six, dvds and checks out another six.  All the dvd cases lock, so as they get checked back in the cases get locked, and as they get checked out the cases get unlocked.  I was having all sorts of trouble with the unlocking equipment at the station I was working yesterday.  Torward the end of the shift a little boy, maybe 6 or 7 watched me struggle to unlock his dvds.  As I finally got them all open he said “You’re not very good at that are you?”  I laughed and said no I wasn’t very good at it.  Then as he watched me scan them all onto his library card he added “But you’re very good at that!”

Kids.  They make you smile.


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Working, working, working

Today was my first shift at the library job. Last Friday was my first shift at the book store job. I have to say that I like both jobs, once I get there and start working. THINKING about going out to work is a different story. On the drive to work I’m wishing I didn’t have to go, and sometimes I watch the clock when I’m there, especially at the beginning of the book store job where I was on my own on a cash register, and there was a continuous line of customers. It felt like about an hour had gone by when really it was only 15 minutes. That was stressful; it had been almost ten days since I had been trained, and at first I couldn’t remember very much! But the other employees were helpful, and eventually I sort of got in a rhythm. As long as no one asked me anything beyond wanting to buy something! The library job this afternoon was fun too, but I had the same problem of not being able to remember just how to get everything done for the patrons, or the right answers to many of their questions. But it will all work out in the end. I hope.

Today we got some pretty significant snow, about 2.5 inches. Katie LOVES snow, so before I went to work we went outside to play. Here she is asking WHY she has to sit still when there are so many snowflakes to chase and catch!

Then we ran around the yard, her chasing my feet and pant leg as well as trying to catch all the falling snow, my shoes kicking up snowballs. We had a great time!

Eventually she looked like this…

…and I had to go to work, so we went inside; she played with her inside toys and her Dad, and I went on to work to make some money to buy dogfood and more toys!

Tomorrow and Wednesday I work 8 hours each, then a day off! YEA! I know I am lucky to have work, so this Thanksgiving I”ll be giving thanks for working again. Even though sometimes I don’t want to leave my warm house and head out. Hope you all have things to be thankful for as well!



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Expanding the mind to hold all the new stuff in

Today was day two of orientation for the library job; sixteen hours of new facts, figures, procedures, policies and demonstrations under my belt. That’s on top of the seven hours of on the job training late last week at the book store new job. The two positions are somewhat alike, and yet totally different. My mind is becoming tired from being forever alert, trying to absorb everything like a sponge without letting any of the valuable information leak back out. I think I will like the work in each place, but hope that I can manage to juggle them both without becoming a burden to either of the schedule makers. Other people do this, juggle two jobs, it can’t be impossible. But it seems pretty difficult at the moment.

And I’m tired. I’m not used to being attentive for this many hours, this many days in a row! After a summer of no employment, it’s been a shock to find myself an employee in two places at once. And gee, what’s all this about having to look appropriate? Six months of slovenly wardrobe choices has made getting dressed in real clothes somewhat of a chore. I can’t wait to get out of them and back into sweats as soon as I get home. And another thing about having a job….no one is doing the vacuuming or laundry while I’m gone. What’s up with that?!

Tonight as I pulled into the grocery store there was a wave of relief that washed over me. I wondered why that was, given grocery shopping isn’t that high on my favorite things list. Then it hit me. At least I know what I’m doing when I’m grocery shopping. I haven’t felt like I knew what I was doing for several days now and it felt good to do something familiar. Now that’s sad!