The Librarian

Some of my fondest childhood memories are of story hour at Tamarack Public Library.  The librarians there were truly of storybook quality.  Mom could drop me off for story hour and go for groceries, knowing I would be entranced by their magic and just...loved--by the books and the ladies--while she was gone.  My favorite librarian was Virginia who had ropy yellow hair that fell to her polyester-clad hips, tight turtleneck sweaters that loved her plentiful curves, and a wide toothy smile.  Virginia must have been scraping along on her rural librarian salary, but she played the part gleefully, never tiring of chatting with me about books, even as I grew into a morose, sullen teenager.  She still recommended great books; she still was patient and she still loved me.  Perhaps Virginia's overflowing heart is the reason no other librarian since has quite been able to please me in the same way.  It must be that Virginia's enthusiasm and warmth set the bar too high.

In my school, we have a barbarian for a librarian who is sometimes referred to as Mrs. Fish due to her unfortunate resemblance to Spongebob's boating school teacher.  On better days, I think this is sort of mean, but on other days, I reach into my bottom left desk drawer and choose from two rubbery fish toys--one smooth Rainbow Fish and one rough Puffer Fish--and then squeeze for all I'm worth.  I took up this form of stress release after my current principal first experienced my former (and more effective) stress release on Mrs. Fish, which consisted of shouting and demanding better for the kids.

The problem is that she doesn't like kids.  And she doesn't appear to like books either.  Worse though is that she doesn't like kids and books together; it seems she'll do anything to keep them apart.  She'll go out of her way to block access to a computer, the lab or any reference materials if, oh say, a research paper is due in a few hours and a student just found out her Works Cited page is done wrong.  She takes a special joy in charging overdue fees and I personally think she uses them for her Healthy Hosiery Fund.  Examples of her cruelty in wielding control are numerous but they really aren't the point here.  We all know someone like this.  There comes a point every few months when she needs to be reminded that she works for the kids, they don't work for her.  Over the years, Mrs. Fish and I have had some whopper blowouts, (that is until the current principal came along and told me in a polite but firm way that this had to end.)  Because of her contemptuous nature, a couple of principals sort of thanked me as they chuckled about scenes like this, and there were plenty of slaps on the back from fellow staff who found both of our roles in these scenes plenty amusing.  There would be one day when she got the best of me: I was nine months pregnant and wobbled immediately from the angry scene to the faculty restroom to settle myself, where I promptly dropped my lunch card into the toilet and--oh, fuck it--flushed it away and went home to give birth to my firstborn.

Sometimes though, a bad librarian doesn't spoil the bunch (of books.) Last week, I took a midget seventh grader down to the principal's office when Mrs. Fish's antics had once again gone on just a day longer than I could bear.  "Olivia," I said to the tiny, cherub-faced 12-year-old who stood wringing her hands before us, "please tell Mr. Appleton what just happened to you in the media center."  As it turned out, Olivia had turned in her slightly late book and tried to check out a new one.  For seventy-cents-worth of late fees, she could neither check out a new book, nor have her old book back after it had been sucked into the "Returned" slot, even though she needed a book for class.  Olivia's earnestness was heartbreaking and apparently fueled more than my own anger.  Later that day, dear old Mr. Appleton put seven dimes on the librarian's desk and with the shark-like jaws of authority, forcibly changed the overdue book fine policy.

This one's for Virginia.  Bite me, Fish-face.