Yes, I spelled it that way on purpose.

Every time there is a break in the school year we seem to hurtle ourselves toward it at break-neck speed, and it's only once the break is nearly over that I'm ready to relax. So, tonight, although I'm tired, I'm still in working gear. There is simply so much to do that it would almost be easier just to keep going in to work to get things done without the constant interruptions that occur with a job like mine.

As it's a service I'm providing, I need to be ready to help out, sometimes without any warning. Yet, the duties that are unseen are the most time consuming. I work in what is essentially a giant file, yet have little to no time for filing the many papers that seem to increase daily on the surface of my desk. Materials are being shelved, but I don't actually have the time to check on the accuracy of the work being done.

Extra reports and plans have been requested of me and are further interfering with the completion of the two jobs I now must complete - those being both mine and that of the clerk who I lost two years ago to budgetary cuts. The loss of Ms. Duran's help has been incalculable, unless you simplify it to man-hours. That is about 1500 man-hours of work, added to the work load I, and all other secondary librarians who lost their clerks, already had.

So, I face a conundrum. Do the best I can without complaint, or express my need for assistance at a never-ending task. If I'm not able to complete my job, should I be given the assistance that the Texas Education Agency recommends for well funded libraries, or do the powers that be find another librarian with fewer outside demands able to devote the whole of his or her life to the job?

The emperor has no clothes. A library of 19,000 items that serves over 1000 people will function best when fully staffed and funded. Now, will I be shot down for speaking the truth?

Sorry, I seem to have meandered from my original thought. The short vacation has arrived, and it will put on the brakes in my momentum, so when we return, I will have to start pushing my Flintstone's car trying to return to the speed I had before we hit this point in time.

Don't get me wrong. I NEED the rest. I need respite from the ever increasing demands, but I also know how hard it will be to return to the

I am convinced that there must be some astrological explanation for the things that are going on lately. Or my karma is... impure to say the least.

Whatever it is, I would really like for it to CALM DOWN for a while, please. I have enough on my plate for the time being. Giving me more to do won't help me get my work done.

Image by Lara Zombie.

That I hate being brave, and having to be brave all the time.

It's exhausting.

Over the past 5 years I have gone through: the dissolution of my marriage, the realization that it was a very good thing for me even though it was heart-wrenching, moving myself and my two kids out of the home they'd spent most of their lives in, the divorce (settlement not in my favor, initially), watching my kids deal with an immature partner chosen by their dad which has negative ramifications to this day, finding my house had been abandoned by the tenant who was a hoarder (dog poop in bags under the sink), the loss of the house, losing people I had become close to through work after they were harassed for months, bankruptcy, being sworn at on a daily basis by students at work with no consequences for the students, and the death of a loved one from inoperable brain cancer.

I am, quite frankly, exhausted. And apparently without a thesaurus.

I was told by the professional job counselor at UT that the librarians she has interviewed who had the most satisfaction with their jobs were school librarians. I *could* have that. I can see it in the faces of the kids who come in regularly to borrow books, and who find new stories to enjoy. But the sad fact is that it's being crushed under increasing duties placed on librarians and other faculty and staff by reductions in staffing and what appears to be a lack of recognition of reality.

I am not without other obligations. I cannot spend my every waking moment dedicated to my job. I need to spend time with my kids. Time paying attention to THEM. (The irony of course being that I'm spending time next to my son, but staring at the computer screen writing, while he reads, so I guess it's not so bad.)

I go to work, and from the moment I get there I am on duty. I sometimes have mini-reference interviews with teachers and students as I make my way up to the library. There are three lunch periods at our school and I work through all of them, having students come in to check out materials, work on the computers, or have a library advisory group meeting.
Librarians are given the same work schedule as teachers and that includes a duty free lunch and scheduled planning time. I haven't received either in two years. So I work through lunch/es, and then the library is expected to be kept open after school for student access. Technically my work hours are 7:45 - 3:45, the same as the teachers, but part of having a good school library is access outside of school hours. Without a clerk or assistant, or after-school childcare, that becomes very difficult on a personal level.

I am a single-parent. Next year, both of my kids will be in Middle School simultaneously. They have to be my priority, and society needs to recognize that.

So, here I am, being brave again. The US needs to recognize that parental time is an investment in its societal future.

Today some of my least interested patrons came in. Usually, they use the time to socialize (and I honestly think they move books on purpose around to drive me crazy) and rarely check anything out. So, today I tried something different. I trapped them and made them listen to me ramble about various interesting things. Then I asked them what interesting things they had heard or read about recently.

For those of you who have taught, or teach, it can be a lot like doing stand-up. To start with I had an audience who was captive - not always a great way to begin. Then, there was the noisy table at the front. blech. Still, I persevered and talked about the most interesting things I could think of and letting my topics wander a little.

From talking about biographies (which were assigned last fall) that didn't get returned, I somehow wandered into Al Capone, Alcatraz (which fit nicely with something they'd recently read) and prohibition. And as I hit that topic I realized that these kids, mostly a group of ELLs who still converse more comfortably in Spanish, probably didn't know that word or have any idea what it meant in the history of our country. So, I stopped.

"Who knows what prohibition is? What does it mean to prohibit something?" And we went from there. So we talked about black markets, gangs, smuggling, the IRS (how I believe they eventually convicted Capone) and how when my dad was a little boy he found a still in his grandpa's barn, and quickly let him know. "Put the hay back and keep your mouth shut!"

From there I rambled into data storage, servers (more unfamiliar territory) and a possible future of data storage (encoded into synthetic DNA). Honestly. And bonus points or a free pencil to anyone who knows what DNA stands for. (no one won that, unfortunately)

I then went into a spiel about Choose Your Own and You Choose books that we have, and letting them know that whatever they were curious about, that I try to have in our collection information about that topic.

At the end of the period, a few kids checked out some books, which is a few more than usual. I was uncertain about how it had gone, but their reading teacher was happy. I kept their attention, and they were quiet for longer than normal.

My take-away from this, and it's kind of what I went in with, is that these kids don't hear much about the vastly weird and interesting things that have happened in our past and continue to happen everyday. My biggest question is if you took the Works of William Shakespeare, encoded it into DNA (which they did), and then inserted that DNA into a viable ovum, what would you end up with? What would it grow into?

We need to bring that dinner table conversation into their lives, to put those questions into their minds.

Fridays are generally my busiest days, which is nice, and exhausting. It's great because teachers are taking advantage of passes and sending students to check out books, and if they're lucky enough in terms of time, they can bring their classes all at once to check out and have some reading time.

When I was still lucky enough to be blessed with a clerk, Cindy could check out books while I could help with other tasks, like teaching, or helping to monitor students on the computers. One day, a few years ago, both Cindy and I were there, as well as two teachers. I was helping a student in the fiction stacks and completely missed a fight starting in the corner near my office window.

One of the teachers, luckily, was a black belt in I'm not sure which martial art, and broke it up. If he hadn't been there, I don't know how far it would have gone.

So, now that I am unfortunately without a clerk, I am somewhat at a disadvantage. To the best of my knowledge there's only been one other fight in there since I've worked in that library, and I was the one who broke it up. I've since been told not to put myself in harm's way, but it's difficult to overcome the parental instinct to stop two young people from hurting each other.

It's a lot of territory to cover. And a lot of jobs to do.

I sat down here at about 6:30, about 12 hours after I got up for work. It has come to my attention that a lot of people have no idea what a school librarian does all day.

It's not that. ---->

So, today I kept track of what I did.

Arrived at work after dropping off my daughter at school, and conferred with a teacher. Was chatting with the district tech guy about the "blue screen of death" and what can be done to fix our library computers when the magnet director asked me to remove an application a parent had put into the outside library book drop (old mailbox) after school. (It worked. It got there.)

Continued on my way upstairs and found my library volunteer, Lyndie (<3), and her granddaughter waiting for me. I unlocked and we went in. 
She began shelving (Godsend!), and I went down to get the application out of the book drop, picked up my mail, dropped off the application with the Magnet Director's assistant and went back up to the library.

The school bell rang, and we worked on shelving. Readjusting the books to fit better, finding and fixing out of place books, and I began pulling out books to remove from our collection. I gave my library aide a task finding book reviews, conferred with a teacher about where to get posters made, and our Parent Liaison about how many people can fit in the library for a meeting. Checked on the color ink cartridge supply (all good).

I showed my aide how to find Editorial book reviews, and how to print only the pages he wants using print preview.  Then had him read through them to find the most useful. While he worked on that I checked email. Asked some incoming students with passes what they were there to do, got their pass and had them sign in on the clipboard on the circulation desk.

I processed an ILL (Inter-Library Loan) for another campus and worked with a student on the computer, helping her to understand the perspective of a person in "exile."

I made more buttons for our AP (for perfect attendance) with my 3rd period aide while we talked. I consider this one-on-one time a type of mentoring and view it as part of my job, even if it occurs only sporadically. I sent him over to the office with the completed buttons.

I took an invoice over to our bookkeeper. Started to check email again, but was interrupted and checked in a book and did a short reference interview with a student to find out what he wanted to read next. Continued going through mail (tangible mail), and checked in an ILL returned from another school. Student returned with a book to check out, and I did a quick repair.  By now, it's 11:09.

I sent over my aide to pick up a shipment of new books. While he did that I called the main library office with a question about some incoming materials and put out more of the new books previously received and processed.

At 11:11 I was possibly supposed to have students coming in to continue testing, so I made sure the tables were clear for that situation. Third period ended, and I went out to do hall duty with a Hi-Lo catalog (High interest, Low level). After the tardy bell rang, I shooed three girls away from the girls bathroom and followed them to encourage them to get to class. On the way back to the library I encountered a student from earlier who had left her book at the computers. We looked for it together and I sent her on to lunch.

I returned to my email and or mail. Phone rang at 11:25. It was a vendor. Luckily I've spent all my book funds so was able to end the call swiftly to get back to my task at hand.

I created and sent off an invoice for the buttons. I emailed teachers to coordinate simultaneously visiting classes. I consulted with a teacher who returned to check her time slot on the schedule.

Checked the campus calendar to see if there was a conflict between some training I have to go to and the testing schedule. Then emailed an AP about it.

Teacher arrived and I consulted with her about her class coming in for research and what resources would be best for them. (books in the collection, encyclopedias, online encyclopedias, and art museum web sites.)

I checked in some books, sent my 5th period aide to sort out his schedule with the counselors. Then my lunch group arrived, followed by a teacher who needed to borrow a TV/DVD/VCR cart for the rest of the week. Had the aide and a lunch student help her take it across campus. Asked incoming students what they planned to use the computers for and had them give me their passes and sign in.

Back to the lunch group. Talked to them about reviewing incoming books and making a top-ten list. As usual, there were arguments about which was better, HP or LotR. 

When they left for class, my aide and I began processing the incoming books, which means checking them off the invoice, stamping them in 4 places, adjusting their records in the catalog, looking up their Lexiles, putting those numbers and titles in a spreadsheet I'm making and making sure they are set for the alarm system. Not all of this happened at once. At this point it's 1 p.m.

I checked out a book and interviewed incoming students regarding their plans and asked them to sign in and give me their passes. One girl arrived but wasn't on the pass, so I sent her back. Looked through the Lone Star List for a display. Got a book ready to mail.

During SEL (nee Advisory), I helped students check out books and with computer projects, or possibly just reminded them no games were allowed.

I took the book to the mail, checked my mail, talked to the AP about new designs for future 100% Attendance buttons, and then did hall duty.

Gave my student aide a project, and then proctored an exam (surprise! they weren't expected today). I then alerted the incoming class planning to use the computer lab of the people testing and asking them to maintain the quiet atmosphere.  At about 2:20, I went to ask the magnet director about when the students should begin their essays. At 2:35 I helped start the magnet essay section, then I went in my office and ate a banana.

Returned to the circulation desk to continue working on the new books. Then had to escort two girls to the restroom. I checked in with my aide on his task (2:42). Then returned to checking and marking books with their Lexiles. I had checked one book when I was interrupted by a raised hand. I helped the visiting/testing 5th graders and then helped a couple of the Fulmore students find a book about their biome. 

Checked in with the aide. Notified the 5th graders of the 5 minutes left to work, and redirected some noisy 8th graders incoming with a pass.

When the 5h graders were finished I took up their tests ans answered some questions about the school and our library and prepared to escort them to the magnet office when the magnet director arrived.

After school tutoring coordinator arrived to set up her materials, and a teacher-mentor arrived for an after-school meeting to be held in the library. I gave bookmarks (cool previously unreleased) to the class in the lab in appreciation for them having been so quiet and well-behaved while our guests were testing.

I switched out the bookmarks on the circulation desk for Valentine's Day (cute puppies, candy hearts, etc.), and returned to working on the Lexiles by the time the end of school bell rang (3:34). Told incoming tutoring students where the phone they could use was, and continued working on my books. Had the boys who come in to play Minecraft after school sign in and told them how long they could expect to stay.

By 4:10 I had entered the remaining books into my list and was ready to go. Heated up my breakfast and was headed out the door when I saw one of the teachers who had made a special book request. This one had arrived and been processed today. She was really happy when I checked it out to her.

Then I headed

Inner-city school librarian.
    At a middle school, which where I grew up was and is called Junior         High. But under either name, not a place educating humans at their         best stage of social development.

    Would you go back and be 13? For even half a day?
    Yeah, me neither.

So, currently single-mother to a 13 year old.
    I get it all day.

    Now, I have to say that he's a good kid. Earlier today, I got a                 compliment on his and his sister's behavior when we were out getting     frozen yogurt.

Converting to Judaism.
    My mother is definitely not happy about this.

Engaged to a Jewish carpenter.
    I'm not sure if my mother is happy about this part or not. She might         feel that there is some hope that there has been a precedent which         he might follow.

Reluctant head chef, human resources manager, housekeeper, pet wrangler, and decision maker at home. I'm pretty certain at this point in my life that I don't want to be a manager. I don't want to have to tell people what to do. Nor do I want to sell anyone anything that they don't want - one of the legacies of public schools underfundedness.