Library Superpowers

Last night we had a father and child in, and the father got so engrossed with looking at porn or whatever on the internet that he let his two year old wander over to the escalator and start to head to another floor. Luckily the librarian grabbed the little boy before he was out of sight. One of the onlookers asked me, "Can't you do something about that?"

"Unfortunately, forcing people to stop being shitty paretns is not a power that we have. However, that would be awesome."

Growth

Today I was carrying a toner cartridge over to the photocopier to change it out, and holding it close to my body so I wouldn't drop it. I passed a patron who pointed to it and asked, "What the hell is that?!" I blinked at him and replied, "It's my tumour." The scary part is that he actually looked at it again and said "Oh," as for a moment he actually believed me.

Light Reading

This is a few days old, but the debate in the comments of this Leader-Post article is very telling about how much library support workers are valued. Most people refer to everyone at the library as a librarian, and if they are aware that there are different classifications within the library system, they still usually don't understand exactly what that entails, or why we mere assistants would think we deserved any pay rates. After all, shelving books is easy! So easy that I am asked once a week or so if I'm a volunteer.

I don't know if this is just a local thing at this library or not, but I've noticed that when people pull out the bound issues of magazines to read at the tables, it's always something completely random, like Bee Culture or Vending Times. Never Vogue or Utne. What the hell?

Another night at Main

Tonight I was the lone clerical working, as usually happens after 5pm. A man came up to me as I was sorting the microfilm and asked if I'd go into the women's bathroom and see if his girlfriend was in there, and politely tell her to hurry up. Because I recently decided to try harder at customer service, I did it. Imagine this, though: you're on the toilet, doing your business in a public restroom, when some complete stranger starts (quietly) calling your name. And you have to respond. As soon as I did it I realized how humiliating it was to both of us. That's what I get for trying to be good at my job. From here on out, it's all half-assed. Anyway, she said she'd be out in a minute, and I slunk away, hoping she wouldn't come to the desk later and recognize my voice.

Of course, that's not the end of the story. About a half hour later security and the paramedics were running past the desk, responding to a call from the librarian -- the woman who I had been sent to find had OD'd in there. Her boyfriend, who I had assumed was just an impatient ass, was actually just waiting for a fix. When he saw the ambulance lights, he split.

They took her to the hospital, and that's the last we'll know of it.

My thoughts, let me show you them

For me, the hardest part of being a library assistant is I always expect people to be better than they are. When patrons leave a huge mess behind, it's not just an annoyance but a moral outrage. I went to a baseball game a few years ago where a homerun was hit into the stands not far from where I was sitting. This was just a minor league game so the ball wasn't worth anything, but even so I watched a grown man grab the ball out of the very hand of the little boy who caught it. When I understand that sort of thing, maybe I'll understand why people toss a pile of books on the floor and leave them for everyone to step over. Or why people put snakes in the bookdrop... or worse.

Everyone Must Shelve!

Because it is December, I've spent most of this evening digging around on the internet, looking for cool t-shirts to buy my friends and coworkers. Because we are always bored at work and have nothing better to do, there's a never ending competition to see who can buy the most awesome shirts.

It is hard to find library-themed shirts that aren't made exclusively for librarians, but there are a few. My favourites are below.


I particularly like this one, as there is nothing more like a crowd of angry LAs than a crowd of angry Communists. And hell, we're union, so to most people it's pretty much the same thing anyway.

General page of library assistant shirts and buttons.


That's How I Roll

Circ & Reference

Library Assistant

Why Are Library Assistants Called Paraprofessionals? (Ah, the age old question. Unless you live in my city, where we're actually called subprofessionals. I feel so respected!)

First post

A little background: I've worked in three different library systems in the past decade, two public libraries and one academic. I've worked in tech services, PR, and now I'm a general library clerical, a library assistant. I often hate my job, and the times I don't are when I'm not actually doing it well.

I used to care. Now I don't. That's how it goes. The posts here will be almost entirely me bitching about work. I hope it will be cathartic. Mostly I want a log, to remind myself exactly how bad it was once I quit. I spend too much time repressing right now.