Library Alchemy

Whenever there’s an elephant in the room, I like to walk right up to it, pat it on the head, ask it how it’s feeling and offer it a peanut.  So, here goes:

Yesterday was a very sad day for the staff and patrons of the Carnegie Library of Pittsburgh.  There was a veritable barrage of media coverage, including official responses and an ongoing community discussion. Library Journal also offers a nice summary here.  Staff were informed of these decisions yesterday at a meeting that immediately preceeded the public press conference.

When I took up library blogging, I never in a million years dreamed that I would be in this position.  Because I am not an official spokesperson for my library, I cannot really comment.  However, as a professional, I do have an obligation to say something.  It would be both irresponsible and psychologically damaging to merrily blog on as if these things weren’t happening.  It’s an interesting conundrum.

Here are my thoughts.

I work with some of the finest people in the world, serving some of the finest people in the world.  The long period of uncertainty preceeding the library cuts, during which I had to maintain a diplomatic silence, taught me a lot about the strengths and weaknesses of my own character, and the need to band together with one’s peers for both strength and solace.  I would rather that this cup had not passed our way, but since it did, well…I made sure I didn’t take a single day for granted.  Not one.  Uncertainty about the future forces you to live in the now.

In a way, it’s a bit of a relief to have it all out in the open and be able to acknowledge it.  The period of uncertainty is not quite over, but at least everything’s been spelled out, and we all know what the stakes are.  And you know something else?

I’m at peace with that.

You see, I’ve been around the block a few times.  Not as many times, as my more experienced peers might point out, as others.  But I have faced periods of great change and challenge in my life before.  At first, these periods seemed like “the end of the world.”  However, after you go through a few radical life changes, you start to realize that the end of “the world” is really simply the end of life as you knew it.  And that there can be blessings hidden in those endings, which will carry you forward to places you could never have imagined.

Example:  once upon a time I was studying for my PhD exams in literature.  One day I “woke up” and realized that, while I was certainly gifted in my studies, they weren’t making me happy.  After an appropriate period of panic, I took a sabbatical from my program, got a mundane job, and spent a good two years trying to figure out what the heck I wanted from life.

It was the scariest thing I’d ever done, and I had no way of knowing what would happen.  My family and friends thought I’d lost my mind.  But having the courage to jump off that particular cliff is what brought me, eventually, to library science, as well as to all the people and circumstances I would need to thrive and grow.   And here I am.

I’ll spare you further anecdotes from my colorful life, but you get the point:  I’ve seen fire and I’ve seen rain, as it were.  So, don’t cry for me, Marge and Tina.  Because today, I have a job I love.  And while anybody with an ounce of common sense around here has been working on her/his Plan B for quite some time, I am going to make the most of every minute I have here, and hope for the best.  If things should not come to pass as I would like,  I’ll burn that bridge when I get there.

Ergo, having acknowledged the big white elephant in the room, I’m going to go back to the business of giving my patrons the very best I have.  Because that is simply how I roll. 

As ever, questions and comments are welcome.  And when we next speak, we’ll get back to what passes for normal at Alchemy.