“Because I’ve seen blue skies, through the tears in my eyes. And I realize, I’m going home.”
–Frank, The Rocky Horror Picture Show
This is good-bye to 2011 and good riddance.
I need another year like that like I need a bullet in my brain.
Here’s hoping 2012 will be a kinder, better year.
A Personal Homecoming:
If there was one thing that seemed to characterize 2011 for me it was my search for a home. Last year I moved from a house I could no longer afford to a much smaller apartment where, I hope, my family and I can grow closer.
The move itself was chaos and pain, ungainly and strewn over weeks, ugly in its waste and expense but it got us there.
In the process, however, I had to give up hundreds of books, maybe over a thousand. They were donated to the Heights Library book sale to find new homes. Many of the books were originally purchased from over twenty years of Heights Library book sales and now they’re back again for a second go-round.
A Public Home:
I started my library career as an adult page at Lee Road for almost two years before I won the original part time paraprofessional adult services position at Noble over 18 years ago.
Years later my job changed and I began working at two buildings. Twenty hours at Lee Road was added to my twenty hours at Noble — making me a full time employee. All during that time Noble was considered my “home base.”
Recently, Noble Neighborhood Library itself was closed for months in a renovation that seemed to drag on and on. The staff was reassigned to the Lee Road Library to work.
During this time of diaspora, we lost several of our Noble staff and gained some new faces.
Finally Noble Neighborhood Library re-opened. We welcomed a new branch manager, Constance Dickerson, a new children’s librarian and a couple of teen librarians as well as a couple of really friendly security guards.
Though the order changes time and again, the neighborhood feel remains the same. . . it feels like home.
A Public Homecoming:
This month things change again.
As I mentioned, I worked at two buildings in the same system for well over a decade. This had many advantages and problems but it worked out well enough for all parties concerned that no one had ever thought seriously of changing things. . . until now.
Now that Noble is a functioning library with two floors to manage, we find ourselves understaffed.
Although I wasn’t at the meeting, I’m told the new Deputy Director Kim DeNero-Ackroyd arrived at a possible solution: Add twenty more hours a week to Noble’s staffing schedule by making me a full time Noble employee.
Adult Services at Lee Road wins by getting more flexibility than my schedule ever permitted and Noble wins by getting some much needed help.
And I . . . I get to come home at long last.
Thrillers, Horror, Comics and Audio Books: The Lair of the Undead Rat with Greg resumes regular posting next week.
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