the loveliest librarian

Librarian (like Stewardess, Certified Public Accountant, Used Car Salesman) is one of those occupations that people assume attract a certain deformed personality. Librarians are supposed to be bitter spinsters; grudging, lonely. And above all stingy: we love our fine money, our silence. I did not love fine money: I forgave much more than I collected. I did not shush people unless they yelled. And though I was technically a spinster, I was bitter only insofar as people made me. It isn’t that bitter people become librarians; it’s that being a librarian may turn the most giving person bitter. We are paid all day to be generous, and no one recognizes our generosity.

As a librarian, I longed to be acknowledged, even to be taken for granted. I sat at the desk, brimming with book reviews, information, warnings, all my good schooling, advice. I wanted people to constantly callously approach. But there were days nobody talked to me at all, they just walked to the shelves and grabbed a book and checked out, said, at most, “Thank you,” and sometimes only “You’re welcome” when I thanked them first. I had gone to school to learn how to help them, but they believed I was simply a clerk who stamped the books.

All it takes is a patron asking. And then asking again. A piece of paper covered with notes, the pencil smudged: a left-hander (for instance, James) will smudge more. The patron you become fond of will say, “I can’t believe you have this book.” Or even better (believe it or not) “You don’t own this book — is there a way I can get it?”

“Yes.” [p. 7]

Title: The Giant’s House: A Romance
Creator: McCracken, Elizabeth
Publisher: Dial Press
Date: 1996
Type: Text