The Rumour Mill

And if yesterday's "incident" (mentioned below) wasn't bad enough, the gossips at the library just made it even worse. While I was having lunch today, the adult services librarian asked me about yesterday's stabbing in the teen area, which her staff were discussing this morning. The lovely ladies on Level 4 (information services, supposedly where the smart people work) heard about a shouting match in the teen area, which all of sudden became a knife match between two guys where one was stabbed. For the love of pete - I think librarians are just as bad, if not worse, then the "downtowners" (the druggie dropout kids) for spreading malicious rumours. So I posted this on our staff blog:

It has come to my attention that some library staff think there was a stabbing in the teen area last night ... this is NOT true. Yesterday at about 4:30 there were two teens involved in a rather loud shouting match, which the security guard dealt with, and while there were some slightly oafish teen boys involved, there were no weapons of any sort, and no injuries resulted excepted to the sensitive ears of those who heard them yelling obscenities (including me, who was 2 feet away at the time). One teen has been kicked out permanently and will be charged with trespassing if he returns, and otherwise the teen area is still a wonderful place full of silly teens, duct tape and in the coming days, a brand new library assistant to help me keep the peace!

I had to refrain from being entirely negative, and from saying "and in the coming days, a new librarian, when I quit", but I decided against it.

One step forward, two steps back

I really think that should be the motto of the teen area at my library, given the history of "incidents" that have happened in the last (almost) two years. Shortly after the teen area opened in 2005 (and before I started working there), a big fight happened in the as yet unsupervised area, the police were called, arrests were made, and some very bad first impressions were formed. A few months later I was hired, hailed as the saviour of the teen area, and tried to start the task of bringing some respect, and good kids, back to the teen area. I started some programs, a teen advsiory board, did some school visits, and put a desk in the teen area. 6 months passed, and there was a custody battle in the teen area involving a dumbass 19 year old who had recently impregnated 2 teen girls who not suprisingly, were ex-best friends. The entire children's area (directly below the teen area, and yes, we all know that is bad planning but we can't change it now), including some small kids, their parents, and a group of mentally disabled adults and their caregivers at a storytime hear all about how this guy wants visitation rights of his fucking kids. They are kicked out, more kids stay away, the principal of a local middle school forbids the kids of his school to come here as it is a "drug-dealing, gang hangout", I start some great new programs, hire an assistant (who quits, but I'm about to hire a cool new one), do more middle school visits, try to convince a bunch of parents that it really is a safe place for their kids, 9 months pass, which brings us to yesterday. Two street kids, one who has been kicked out permanently (but keeps coming back like a bad rash) and another who just finished a short jail stint, start yelling at each other so that all 4 floors (including some seniors, cute little tweens, and a few other kids who will undoubtedly never return) can hear "You fucking rapist, get over here so I can fucking kill you", along with a series of other assorted threats and expletives, for a good 5 minutes (which believe me, is an awful long time) until the security guard came and broke things up and called the police. For anyone who wants to make the argument "all teens are like that", I must disagree with you ... that really cannot be the case. And if it is, teen services worldwide are doomed and will all have to shut down their teen areas before they have even opened. A university library in Melbourne is sounding really good right about now.

And colder...

I take back what I said yesterday about it not getting any colder ... this morning it was -42 with the windchill, and that's all I have to say about that.

Just when you thought it couldn't get any colder...

With the windchill, today's temperature is -36. What does that feel like, you ask? Sort of like the headache you get from drinking a slurpee too fast, but on all exposed skin of your body (including your eyes). It certainly doesn't help that I've had a cold and sore throat for the last few days. My goal this week is warding off pneumonia - if I can do that, everything else will be a (snowy) walk in the walk. But given my track record with illnesses, I'm not feeling very optimistic about that right now. I had to walk to a meeting this morning that was 5 blocks away from the library, and with the wind, the snow, and the cold temperature, by the time I got there I was a human icicle (even with my posh North Face puffy jacket, boots, hat, gloves and fleece-lined jeans) and my face was completely numb. It took about 10 minutes for me to get feeling in it again. I suppose by sharing the temperature of my lovely city with you I run the risk of giving away what province I live in, because there are very few places in Canada that are this cold right now - and I'll give you a hint, I don't live in Prince George or Whitehorse. But honestly, at this point I'm really just a hop, skip and jump away from telling everyone my name, address, and what library I work for, and why they should never aspire to work here themselves ... granted, maybe that's just the cold and shitty teenagers talking for me, but that Melbourne or London plan (screw Boston - it gets cold there too) is sounding better and better!

The Plan

So it's settled - my next job will either be in London, Melbourne or Boston. Why these three cities, you ask? Well, the Swearing Librarian has decided to take her hiking boots out of the closet, and these cities will help in developing some of her travel plans. In London, I could spend my vacation time in Europe, Iceland, or possibly even find cheaper flights to Africa (then from the West Coast of Canada). From Melbourne (that's Mel-bun, not Mel-Born), I could see the rest of Australia, New Zealand, and maybe even Tuvalu. And in Boston, one of the few American cities I would consider living in, I would be closer to the Maritimes (without actually having to live there), New York, and would have greater access to direct flights to Central and South America (I hear the Inca Trail is much better the second time around, especially if you're not a token sick girl). I should also mention that these three cities are all pretty awesome on their own, and I have at least one contact in each place - the Boston one being the farthest of the stretch, because she is more of an acquaintance than a friend, but an acquaintance who happens to know one of the HR guys at the Boston Public Library).

Of course, by settled, I mean that this idea is purely hypothetical and dependant on finding jobs there, having the three foreign countries want to give me a job over one of their own, and my being able to afford the mental and monetary costs of moving and living there. But what the fuck - I'm young(ish), have no husbands or kids that I know of, a supportive family (right, guys? Guys? Are you still there?), and if I want to follow in the footsteps of my intellectual freedom and role model prof from library school who's worked all over the world, I better get cracking. I've got to start somewhere ... and god knows somewhere aint here, where tonight it is -32 with the windchill, which is just inhumane if you ask me. My two exceptions to this latest, manic idea of mine will be A) finding the PERFECT job elsewhere (such as the Innocentio Library in Florence or teaching children's lit at UBC without having to get a PhD) and B) finding the PERFECT guy elsewhere (such as Strombo - George Stroumboulopoulos - in Toronto or Ewan MacGregor's younger brother - if he has one - in Scotland. I'd love to have Ewan, but he's married with kids and I may be many things, but a homewrecker is not one of them). Barring those two highly unlikely events, mark my words - this time next year, I'll be in London, Melbourne or Boston.

Two Lost months

This is absolutely UNACCEPTABLE - I just found out that Lost is on hiatus and won't be back until FEBRUARY. I know I have many other shows to tide me over until then and I can rent some new tv series on DVD that I haven't seen yet, but what the fuck! I have to wait for two months to see if Henry/ Benjamin dies, if Kate escapes, if Sawyer and Jack get it on ... seriously, are they trying to turture us? If I were a two year year old I would throw a tantrum in the ABC studios, stamp my foot and say "but's it's not fai-air!".

Ephebiphobia

Ephebiphobia is an abnormal and persistent fear of teenagers ... but what happens if a teen services librarian has this fear?

I'm not afraid of them at this very moment, probably because there aren't any in the teen area, but I have had a very productive morning looking at all sorts of job postings that I can't really apply for because A) I don't have the experience and B) I sort of have a job right now. At the very least it seems I need two years experience to get anything else decent (and even that may be in another crappy mid-sized Canadian city), which means I have to be here for another 7 months, but many of the better jobs require a minimum of 5 years experience. I could get a "trainee librarian" position at a university in London and get that valuable university experience, but I would be paid next to nothing while I was there and given the cost of living in London, that is not an option.

So I suppose I should focus on the task at hand, which is getting through the next few months, and one way I can do that is by planning crazy programs like one I just saw described in VOYA - Gocks! Goth Sock Puppets for Teens. It sounds like an awesome, and relatively cheap, program to do, and we could make goths, emos, punks, etc. I knew there was a reason I bought all those safety pins for my Halloween costume!

Duct tape forever

I think that duct tape and teen services go together like peas and carrots, as my friend Forrest Gu-ump would say. Yesterday was the second day of my week-long duct afterschool duct tape program, and like last year, The Tape seems to attract all ages, personalities and economic classes of teens. Some of them are nice to each other and make pleasant (or unpleasant) conversation, and some of them are mean to each other in the same way they probably do every day at school, but regardless, they seem to have fun making purses, wallets, bracelets, roses, Ipod covers, and generally sticking themselves together with tape. I think the key to a successful duct tape program is the multicoloured tape you can purchase at craft stores such as Michaels - the tape comes in nearly every colour of the rainbow including hot pink. The only problem is that for less than a third of the amount of tape you get on the big silver roll, you are paying twice the price, but if your library can afford it, the colours will seal the deal, so to speak.

For the record, I'm in a slightly better mood today ... but then again I've only been here for 20 minutes and the druggie dropouts have only just arrived and have not yet started to test my patience. I wasn't wild about it being -20 with the windchill this morning, either.

Kill 'em all!

At the risk of sounding like a bad librarian, I hate them all. That's right, you heard me, I HATE THEM ALL. And by all I don't just mean teens, but any people who hang out in the teen area, which today apparently includes really smelly (and I mean smelly as a reflection of their body odour, and not their social status) homeless people, 20-somethings who have just been released from jail and are high on whatever, and assorted other people who don't belong here. The topic of the day has been who is "jumping" or "jacking" who outside in the park, and by that they mean beating them up to steal a bike, some money, or even just a cigarette from them. One guy even came in with blood smeared all down his shirt, but apparently I'm not allowed to kick him out until he actually does something unlawful in the library. Unfortunately his pathetic existence is not enough to warrant me telling him to fuck off and never come back. It doesn't help that in 30 minutes I'm doing my duct tape craft and they will all probably want to participate, which will keep them here even longer. This is a craft where large amounts of tape, scissors and a couple exacto knives are involved, which I plan on cutting a hole in my leg (no pockets today) to keep it safe before I let them put their scummy little hands on my knife. On the bright side they might take the knife outside and accidentally and kill some of their friends, which would mean there would be a few less teenagers in the world. Am I bitter today? What the fuck do you think?

This is a picture of the card he sent last year, which may not have described my mood at the moment but definitely gets marks for creativity. I think it's a cruel injustice that I did not grow up England, because I obviously have a British sense of humour. Anyone who would like to debate that must first have a discussion with me about The Office tv series (the British one, not the American one).

Older but not necessarily happier

Never before has a picture so perfectly matched my mood. This is the birthday card I received today from my english muffin, after having a ridiculously shitty birthday. No people died and I didn't get hit by a truck, but I was in a terrible mood all day today and that was not helped by having to be at a staff development day where we completed the "Dream Phase" of our "Appreciative Inquiry" project where we talked about the positive things at our library. This would have been an ok exercise if I was grouped with some of the crazy and wonderfully sarcastic people who I work with, but instead I was stuck with a few women from the circulation department who wanted nothing to do with it, even if it involved unecessary amounts of sarcasm and cynicism.

In addition to thinking about our vision of the future of the library (mine included a future where I was no longer working there) and creating a collage for a "shared vision", we had to act out a brief play detailing what we thought the future of our library should look like. While some groups did talk shows, Mister Rogers, chorus lines and crazy storytimes, I (as "dramatic leader" for the group) had my group act out a "just a dream" scenario where I was working in the teen area and after witnessing two girls ripping pages from magazines and two guys doing a drug deal, I call the security guard, who kicks them all out. Then because it is so quiet, I get bored and take a nap, and wake up 20 years in the future, at which time the teen area is a perfect place, they all do their homework, read, get along, and offer to buy me lunch, and again, I have a nap, and wake up back in 2006 and say "oh, that was just a dream, wasn't it?" Take that, dream phase! Personally I was quite proud of our dramatic achievement, but then again I was always one for the mockumentaries.

Continuing with my day, I was given a brownie with a candle in it that I couln't eat because it had walnuts, and then a box of chocolates that I couldn't eat because they had hazelnuts, and then I went out for dinner not for me but for a woman who was leaving the library after working there for ten years. Wow, what a momentous birthday. I have to say that the highlight of my day was receiving the card from my english friend that you see above. He is obviously someone who undertstands me, and he doesn't even live on the same fucking continent!

It could always be worse

There may be things about my job and life I don't like, but at least I don't have a crazy ex-husband like my co-worker the new outreach librarian does. As a computer analyst and someone who had just built a house, he felt like his life was missing something, and so he decided to start building a steel sailboat which he intends to sail around the world. While this plan is very ambitious and quite cool, it didn't really include his wife and two kids (age 6 and 13), who he expected to drop everything, sell the house and just go sailing for the next 10 years. If this didn't agree with them, well then they didn't have to come, but he would still be selling the house and doing the trip regardless of what they thought. My co-worker, who felt like she was in a book or movie (especially when the local newspaper decided to interview her husband about his project and possibly create a Canadian version of Ewan Mcgregor's Long Way Round - book and tv show, but with a boat instead of motorcycles) decided to leave him and take her kids with her, and bring them here to this mid-sized Canadian city to start a new life. I told her I thought it was a pretty damn good reason to leave your husband ... it's not one fo those things that they could compromise on down the road. He's sailing around the world, and to hell with his wife and kids. Here's the website that will detail the building of the boat, and likely also the journey around the world:

http://sailboat.creatica.org/index.html

It's Kind of a Funny Story

The Tentacles are the evil tasks that invade my life. Like, for example, my American History class last week, which necessitated me writing a paper on the weapons of the Revolutionary War, which necessitated me traveling to the Metropolitan Museum to check out some of the old guns, which necessitated me getting in the subway, which necessitated me being away from my cell phone and e-mail for 45 minutes, which meant that I didn't get to respond to a mass email sent out by my teacher asking who needed extra credit, which meant other kids snapped up the extra credit, which meant I wasn't going to get a 98 in the class, which meant I wasn't anywhere close to a 98.6 average (body temperature, that's what you needed to get), which meant I wasn't going to get into a Good College, which meant I wasn't going to have a Good Job, which meant I wasn't going to have health insurance, which meant I'd have to pay tremendous amounts of money for the shrinks and drugs my brain needed, which meant I wasn't going to have enough money to pay for a Good Lifestyle, which meant I'd feel ashamed, which meant I'd get depressed, and that was the big one because I knew what that did to me: it made it so I wouldn't get out of bed, which led to the ultimate thing-homelessness. If you can't get out of bed for long enough, people come and take your bed away.

Ned Vizzini, author of Teen Angst? Naaah..., Be More Chill, and now this, It's Kind of a Funny Story, is only in his twenties, and that definitely contributes to the authenticity of the voice of his unique male characters. Funny Story's Craig Gilner is your average 15 year old boy: pressured by school and life in general, to the point that he becomes overly depressed and ponders suicide. Luckily he calls the Suicide Helpline before doing anything stupid, and they direct him to check himself into the hospital, where he spends 5 days in an adult psychiatric facility (because the teen ward is being renovated and is full). There he comes to terms with many issues, finds his inner talent as an artist, and meets a similarly conflicted girl named Noelle. On the day he is released he knows that he is not completely cured, but he does feel a change in himself: his brain doesn't want to think anymore, all of a sudden it wants to do. The story is loosely based on Vizzini's life; he spent a week in a an adult psychiatric facilty in 2004, and upon being released, wrote this book in under a month. Not only is it extremely well-written and insightful for such a young writer, but it is also an important book for teen boys and girls to read who are pressured by life. Hell, that's all of us, isn't it? Everyone should read this. It is reminiscient of other attempted suicide/ depression novels such as The Perks of Being a Wallflower, Catcher in the Rye, and even The Bell Jar, but the difference is this character is able to pull himself out of his downward slide, and hopefully this novel will do the same for any troubled teen reading it.

Deep thought of the day

If I were a nut that was allergic to nuts, would it mean that I couldn't touch or eat myself?

My next job (that I don't have yet)

Maybe it's the cold (which granted is probably still nicer than rain), the kids, my teen services assistant leaving, or the general lack of cool people here, but my mid-sized Canadian city is really losing its appeal by the day. My conference proposal for next year was declined too - which is actually a good thing, because I can't say I was overly excited about talking about problematic teens in front of a few hundred other librarians. If I play my cards right, the director might still let me go to the conference in Newfoundland ... although our new outreach librarian is now his new favourite person, and maybe he'll want to send her instead. She's taken over my office - we are supposed to be "sharing" a desk, but it's now essentially her space and I am out in the teen area all the time.

Sometimes I really wish I could just adopt the "I don't give a shit" attitude, and not care about low attendance at programs or kids who wreck all my stuff in the teen area, but when I try to, it just makes me even more pissed off when they do something bad. My aforementioned muffin has a theory about me doing the Iraq library tour before I can go to nice libraries in Barbados, Italy, Australia, whatever, which makes me feel remotely better about working in this city. The idea that I had before about "this is just an extended travel experience, so suck it up, because while travelling is not always a walk in the park, it does make for a damn good story" is just not working anymore. I'm totally divided about whether I want to try and work with kiddies next time (who would appreciate all things Little Wolf) or in a more snooty university setting - or even try to get a job at library for a corporation, where I might be fundamentally opposed to what the company does (Teck Cominco, etc) but would make shitloads more money. I may not even be able to get a job in those two types of libraries, but it never hurts to try, right? Or maybe it will hurt, but at least it will hurt somewhere else than in this particular city.

Those damn kids, part 22

A few of the people that I sent my Emo pictures too (I was going to post them here, but have decided to stay faceless) said that I looked kinda scary as an Emo ... I told them that most of the kids in the teen area kinda scare me, so now they know what I'm up against. There's this crazy kid that has been in here the last few days who walks around talking to himself about white supremacy and "not gonna fucking fit in their mold - not gonna do it" and stomping alot ... he hasn't done anything officially wrong yet, but I'm sure it's just a matter of time. And to hear these kids talk about jail time is like the way I used to talk about music, boys and lip gloss when I was in high school - it's gone past being a cool thing to be in jail, and now it's just a given. How long you are in jail and for what is the main topic of interest. Really, they should be talking about how Nate just died on Six Feet Under and how Mr Echo was killed by black smoke on Lost ... these damn kids really don't have their priorities straight.

Lately, my English muffin and I have been having email discussions about the "yoof" of today ... and I've decided that they are exactly like the yoof of yesterday and the day before - they want to appear like they are shit disturbers, but when it comes down to it they just want to fit in. The hippies, the activists of the 70s, 80s, 90s, the Greenpeacers, the Nine Inch Nails fans - they are really all the same, and just want to be part of some sort of group. Doesn't matter what kind of group it is, as long as they have friends in it who understand them. I think the yoof of today also want to be part of that group, but don't even know what the groups stand for, hence their rallying for lost causes or caring for a week before they go back to their Ipods filled with punk bands (when really all they want to listen to is N'Sync). On Halloween I had the tv in the teen area on Muchmusic and they were playing "classic" Halloween songs, including "Everybody - backstreet's back again" and this tough goth chick was talking about how much she liked the Backstreet Boys when she was in grade 1, and how everyone thought they were dreamy. Meanwhile I was thinking about how everyone loved the Backstreet Boys when I was in 1st and 2nd year university. And of course the funniest thing about these kids wanting to be all goth and punk and alternative is that by piercing and tattooing and dyeing they are spending money on the exact things the marketing execs want them to, and by doing so are definitely not alternative in the least. But it was the same way when I was in highschool ... so really, nothing has changed apart from the price of pop culture.