There’s a lot more to being a librarian than checking out books and hushing noisy readers. In the digital age, librarians are a human form of Internet, custodians of knowledge and trailblazers of a better, smarter way of learning
“What do you do?” It’s the go-to question when you meet someone at a party. As irritating and predictable as it can be, we reach for this question when we’re looking for common ground with a stranger. Do I relate to what you do? Do I find it interesting? Then I’ll probably relate to and be interested in you.
Here’s how those conversations have gone for me over the years:
“So, what do you do?”
“I’m a librarian.”
“Aw. That sounds so peaceful.”
“So, what do you do?”
“I’m a librarian.”
“Jeez, I’d love to get to read all day.”
“So, what do you do?”
“I’m a librarian.”
Awkward silence while they look around for someone more interesting.
Four years ago, I gave up my career in librarianship and took a job in communications. It was time. I’d studied library science, got my Honours and was almost finished my Master’s in the field, and had lived and breathed libraries and archives for the better part of 20 years. I was tired of the culture and the same conversations and topics. Those party questions were getting fairly tiresome too.
The change was good. I enjoyed the new challenge, and looking back, I can see that it benefitted me in ways I hadn’t anticipated: it increased my confidence, it allowed me to draw on my extensive experience as a librarian, a technophile, and freelance writer, and it broadened my network.
For a variety of reasons, though, this year, I found my way back to libraries. And it was like coming home.
I now manage a special library in a university Faculty. It’s the venue of choice when academics want to impress their visitors.
Walking into it, you’re overcome with the smell of the books. There are tall windows with floor-to-ceiling curtains, there’s dark wood shelving, and a long table for study and meetings. Centre stage, there’s a cabinet of rare books, their leather binding beckoning bibliophiles from far and wide.
What do I do? Everything. From switching on the computers in the morning, to helping staff and students find information, cataloguing books, managing the server, and archiving research data.
Three big projects are keeping me busy, all towards the goal that attracted me to the job in the first place: to bring the library into the digital age. What’s not to love?
I spend a good portion of the day alone, working away on my projects, getting to know the library stock, and dreaming up other projects that will benefit my Faculty. A friend says she’d go mad, being alone for such long periods. I’m thriving. It’s stimulating, exciting, and fulfilling, in a way that my communications job wasn’t.
Which is not to knock my brief foray down an unfamiliar career path. I’ve proved to myself that I could do it. Part of the reason I went down that route was to find out if I could do something completely foreign to what I’d studied. I did, and I could. Mission accomplished.
But libraries are my calling. Say what you will about librarians: some of them, like me, are in love with what they do. Thomas Wolfe wrote that you can’t go home again. I say you can.
If you meet me for the first time at a party and you feel the need to ask me what I do, be prepared for a deluge of enthusiasm. I’m back home and all is right with the world.
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