And so it begins...

Working in a library is a bag of mixed emotions.

On one hand you're in a room that's a fountain of information, a considerable luxury afforded to far too few people the world over; you feel a sort of ambassador of this endangered beast like machine in the face of massive government budget cuts and a public that just doesn't really appreciate the benefit libraries provide to communities.

But on the other hand...

... I have a fountain of information in my pocket. My iPhone can access pretty much anything in the library immediately. And it doesn't have sporadic opening hours. Actually, it's an iPhone. It has an awful battery life. 

That's the first big problem facing libraries. Secondly, tramps.

Seriously, where else can drunk bums spend hours upon hours of the day in shelter, warmth and mild mannered staff who have no real right to evict them?

So basically, libraries need to address two major concerns in order to better provide a more streamlined service. Fundamentally alter the services underpinning their very existence on a complete, unforgiving scale and vet their clientele. 

Another noticeable occurrence that needs addressing in libraries is that time is affected incredibly. It's not necessarily slower and it's certainly not faster in a library, rather, it fluctuates and deceives you. In some ways it helps: while lamenting for arduous minutes at the fact that time isn't going fast enough, you look stare at a wall in boredom for what seems like a moment and you realise you're already close to lunch. I think it's strange anomalous occurrences like this that account for the fact that almost every librarian you'll meet is like 700 years old. They just somehow find themselves in a weird kind of time loop and walk in as a teenager and walk out with a hip replacement. 

I manage two elderly chaps. Who both claim to suffer from a syndrome known as CFS. Chronic fatigue syndrome. Apparently, there's no cure for it, there's no real logic behind it, some people just generally get REALLY tired, REALLY quickly....

I'm just throwing this out there... Like, seriously, I know it might sound CrAzY or something, and bear with me on this one, it'll make sense in the end, I think..... But could it perhaps have.... A SLIGHT something to do with the fact that you're both a BILLION YEARS OLD?!?!?!

Seriously! One has come OUT of retirement, to work at my library, only to refuse to actually DO anything because he's perpetually tired. Why work?! ARGRHGRHGHHH!!!!!

Another thing is that sometimes it appears that libraries aren't particularly interested in procuring the best talent in the world. Now I know, that shines a bad light on myself as a member of a library service, I can take it- I'm not particularly gifted, I can shelve books and have discovered a way in which this talent help's me to feed myself.

However honestly, having a conversation with one of the two elderly chaps I manage regarding work experience children that volunteer in the library, he said:

"Well, when I worked in                , we had a bunch of kids come in and work for us. Some were really up for it, some were just doing it because they had to, I guess it's the luck of the draw who you get."

So far so good...

"I remember there was this one boy, lovely lad, he had a learning disability. But he fitted in so well, so much better than those normal kids, you couldn't tell him apart from any other full time member of staff..."

......

SERIOSULY?!?! This guy literally just said to me that a kid with mental problems fits in better with library faculty than those that aren't mentally challenged?!? What kind of light does that shine on library staff?!

>>Disclaimer, I'm not a bigot and nor do I discriminate against anyone based on any kind of mental illness or disability. But the context in which this statement was said and the earnestness in which it was delivered really made me go: Wow, you've just pegged yourself with a mentally challenged teenager.

Anyway, this blogs about ways to survive in a library that I pick up along the way. Ive gone about a month and a half here and the most pertinent thing I've discovered is that tea is a staple. Never turn your nose up at tea. Librarians live and die by tea. So get used to it. (It actually kind of helps, a small dose of caffeine, keeping you awake enough to not curl up and not so much that you bounce off the walls and kill yourself of boredom. So tea, good.