I didn't have my game face on though on the day that Carrie called and asked me to join the library board. Its a 4 year term. I said yes. Oops.
So I attended my first board meeting. The whole thing was troubling and mid-way through, I realized why. It has the potential to be like the experience of my college Human Sexuality class. Just go with me here...
In December of 1999, Ryan and I started "going out" (oh don't you love that term? "Where are you going? I just don't understand." "We're not going anywhere, Mom. We're just going out.").
In January of 2000, I took Human Sexuality for interterm, which means you're in the class for 6 hours a day for a month. It involved lectures on the ins and outs (sorry, I'm not mature. I realize this.) of everything having anything to do with how we humans experience sexuality. There were videos. There was lots of required reading. And there was journaling. I resented it all. Absolutely all of it. I had just started this out-of-this-world amazing relationship with this increeeeeedibly sexy guy, and I was being forced to examine it all as though it was a science. The journaling assignments were the worst. I think I lied in half of them - just made up crap - because I didn't want to really have to think about what makes humans sexual.
That class - because of its timing in my life - stole some of the joy of my situation.
I get it now, though, that I really missed out. Ada and Larry were awesome teachers. The content was framed in such a great way. If I were to take it now, I would find it all so fascinating.
Back to the library board...
I looooooove to read. I consume books. Consume them. I keep a pen and journal in my lap when I read them so I can scratch down quotes and just great phrasing that I find. I fold down the pages. I generally don't return them on time. The smell of a book that has spent several years in a library is so so so lovely to me. I have a friend that won't check out anything from the library. She thinks of all the germs. How the books have sat on the backs of toilet seats and the pages turned by grimy hands and breathed on by stinky strangers. I cannot identify. The more loved and read they have been before they come to me, the better. Just one of many reasons to use a library instead of a bookstore.
But did you know that there are long discussions about all things bookish in order to provide us with those dearly loved books? There are.
I was in 4H for about 2 months as a kid, and then quit because all this "motioning" and "seconding" and "so carrying" that happened in the meetings got in the way of enjoying life. But in order to run a library, there is a lot of such action.
I am happy that I had a moment of weakness and signed on to this board member task. But I'm worried that my joy of consuming books will be tarnished by it. Can I be grown-up enough this time to appreciate both being a board member and my relationship with these books? We shall see!
That class - because of its timing in my life - stole some of the joy of my situation.
I get it now, though, that I really missed out. Ada and Larry were awesome teachers. The content was framed in such a great way. If I were to take it now, I would find it all so fascinating.
Back to the library board...
I looooooove to read. I consume books. Consume them. I keep a pen and journal in my lap when I read them so I can scratch down quotes and just great phrasing that I find. I fold down the pages. I generally don't return them on time. The smell of a book that has spent several years in a library is so so so lovely to me. I have a friend that won't check out anything from the library. She thinks of all the germs. How the books have sat on the backs of toilet seats and the pages turned by grimy hands and breathed on by stinky strangers. I cannot identify. The more loved and read they have been before they come to me, the better. Just one of many reasons to use a library instead of a bookstore.
But did you know that there are long discussions about all things bookish in order to provide us with those dearly loved books? There are.
I was in 4H for about 2 months as a kid, and then quit because all this "motioning" and "seconding" and "so carrying" that happened in the meetings got in the way of enjoying life. But in order to run a library, there is a lot of such action.
I am happy that I had a moment of weakness and signed on to this board member task. But I'm worried that my joy of consuming books will be tarnished by it. Can I be grown-up enough this time to appreciate both being a board member and my relationship with these books? We shall see!