Library grrrl

Hey all,

If you're going to the ALA Midwinter Conference in Seattle, Washington this weekend, I'd love to see you, even if it's just a wave from across the exhibits hall. I've been looking forward to this particular conference ever since I moved away from New York City. I miss my old friends and colleagues from NYPL. Many of us have dispersed. It's a bit humbling to know that colleagues who have started their careers the same time I did are now managing branch librarians and award committee members. It's not as if my friends had pegged me "Least likely to pause her career in order to stay home with her child," but there are times when I am rueful about having left a 30 hour job with benefits and paid holidays. Truth be told (I get stomachaches when I lie), I quit my salaried job a year before I got pregnant. Officially, I quite because I believed I could make a steady living a substitute librarian while pursuing my writing career full-time. They say, "Don't quit your day job," and I did just that. It was the proverbial "jump off the cliff" into who-knows-where. Had I thrived as a freelance writer, people could say, "How inspiring, she followed her dreams, blah blah." Really, I wanted to see what would happen. If I didn't quit my job (which had a schedule that was leading to burn-out), I would have wondered what my life would have been had I not had the chutzpah to leave.

Did I make the right decision? In the short term, no. However, the long-term effects are still up for debate. After I gave birth, I was glad that I didn't have to think about leaving my child in someone else's care. I was relieved that I had made my decision to put my library career on hold before the era of multiple night-wakings and round the clock nursing. I would have gone back to work had there been need to do so, and yes, I know how extraordinarily lucky I was that the family could survive on one income. I was glad to know that my colleagues who had both children and full-time salaried jobs also had parents in the area who would take care of the grandchildren.

I don't miss my library work schedule, but I do miss my colleagues. I miss talking about children's books with patrons. I miss my colleagues and I trading wacky patron stories. Oh, whoops, we didn't actually do that last bit. Really!(Uh-oh, here comes the stomache-ache.)


Photo: Pre-pregnant Alkelda in her usual reference desk attire.