Being a Librarian

Earlier today a friends sent me an e-mail telling me that it looked like I found the perfect job for me. I guess in many ways she is right. I enjoy what I do. Yes, of course there are frustrations, stresses and at times burn out. Before I went back to Oklahoma for Thanksgiving, I was in desperate need for a get away. I was traveling down a road of half empty glasses. But I took some time off, and then had a long New Year's break to get myself into perspective on the glasses. I came back refreshed and recharged.
So why is this the perfect job for me. One of the best things about my job is the sheer variety of each and every day. No two are exactly the same. And even an average day can turn on a dime--but usually not in a good way. I like that there is always something to do. Some other thing that can be imagined. I spent a year in Japan bored out of my gourd sitting at a desk for the 25 hours that I had to be there without actual work to do. It was the worst working year of my life. I don't have a strong enough imagination to entertain myself. My personal battery winds down and I don't feel like doing even the little that I have to do. Fortunately I learned this about myself early on and have only had one such job in my life.
Being a librarian means that the day if filled with fitting a variety of projects in to the day--sometimes they fit smoothly and sometimes they don't. Programming means beginning able to use creativity and imagination to provide interesting--we hope--activities for the community. Answering information questions is a dual pleasure when all goes well--I get to help someone and I learn something as well. I like to help people and I am a people person. Of course, I don't care to deal with unpleasant people and of course I don't always handle them in the best manner. But I try and I want to provide the best service whenever possible. I like connecting people--whether with other people or information. It took me a long time to realize that not everyone functions on this level. I want the people I know to know each other. It always surprises me when people want to keep their friend groups seperate. On one level I can understand this but in reality it is a alien concept for the way I actually function. It pleased me when my college friend Karen and my Hawaiian friend Lillian took a vacation together after I introduced them. So if I can hook someone up with information they need at work, I am well satistified.
One of the things I get to do that I probably enjoy the most is problem solving. Almost everything I do, involves chorographing solutions to usually mundane but sometimes extremely exotic situations. Of course my daily hope is that nothing serious happens that will cause the house to tumble down around my ears. As always I hope for the best but as worse case scenario girl I plan for the worst.