If you haven't been in a school library in awhile, you might be surprised. Gone is the tight-lipped, bun-wrapped, vulture-like schoolmarm shushing the students with an icy stare from her beady, little eyes. In her place is (I hope) a fun-loving, super smart and, really, surprisingly-trim-for-her-age librarian who "gets" students.
As with all transformations, though, there is a downside to today's accessible, active school library. Often, working in one feels a bit like running downhill with a stiff wind behind you and a really loud soundtrack thrumming in the background. Because of the library's propensity for craziness, I made myself a little pledge to do just one thing at a time this school year, and to look people in the eyes when they are talking to me.
Easier said than done. But a pledge well worth honoring. Unlike, say, all the pledges I've heard in the past few weeks. But that's another blog. . . .
It has been good for me to take my hands off the keyboard when someone's bidding for my attention. Sure, it probably means that the Pulitzer-worthy sentence I was typing will fall victim to my limited memory, becoming just another pile of broken Times New-Roman letters scattered at my feet. But this process of stopping, looking and trying super hard to really listen has been a healthy one for me.
And it would behoove me to adopt this goal at home as well, where, more often than not, a question from daughter Allison is met either with distracted silence or with the uttered gripe that "I've been on the same sentence for 10 minutes, dadgummit!!!" She is, after all, my housemate for just another year and a half, if all goes as planned.
And I really, really want things to go as planned.
Not that I'm hankering to convert her bedroom into a home spa or anything. But I do desire the chance for Allison to find her own way in the world, all my well-taught life lessons and super helpful suggestions tucked snugly in her brain, and her endless clothes jammed into a very packed van.
Both at work and at home, then, it just makes sense for me to focus on the here and now (or the "hear and WOW!," depending upon what exactly I'm hearing). Who cares about cataloging books when a kid leans over the counter to tell me her tales? Those are the stories I should be cataloging. The ones that are connected to the person who is standing in front of me, wanting--for whatever reason--to tell the 50-year-old librarian who can sometimes be cool a little something about herself.
After all, what's the point of all those stories unless someone's listening, really listening?
No comments:
Post a Comment