Career Update

When last we talked about jobs, I was a Toddler Teacher at a preschool. When the Husband and I were preparing to move to Vermont, I was ready for a decision: is it more important to me to work with kids or in a library? As it turned out, the decision was actually: do I want to take a job at a preschool or do I want to stay unemployed indefinitely? I took the path that allowed us to buy food.

I knew that I needed to find a way out when I was at a bookstore talking to the salesperson and said, "I used to be a librarian," and the past tense made me cry. (Yes, literally, though not until I left the store.) And so it was a great relief when a library job opened up at an institution of higher education. Since I've still not decided exactly how easily Google-able I want to be in this blog iteration, I'll just say that it's a specialized sort of tech school and leave it there.

As with even the best jobs, there is some weirdness mixed in.

First, it's personally weird for me to not only not be a children's librarian, but also to not be a public librarian.

Second, though I am technically an academic librarian, my institution is a tech school. Practically speaking, that means I am in a subculture of academic librarianship. My institution is focused on the teaching of a set of skills, and thus isn't focused on in-depth research. Honestly, I prefer that, because most of the people here genuinely care about teaching their craft. (If they didn't, they could go out into the world, and just, you know, do their craft.) It does mean, though, that most of the articles written about my general field aren't applicable to me. This is a disappointment because boy, do I love a professional article.

Third, I am working for the largest organization I have ever worked in but I am a sub-department of one. There are, of course, other professionals providing academic support, but there are no other professionals providing library support. Combine that with number two, and sometimes I feel lonely.

Finally, I live in an awesome little town that has a vaguely college-y vibe. As with any college, there are some people who graduate from the school, but never really graduate from the town. They kind of hang around in limbo, and their limbo involves coming to the library to read magazines and "do research". So even though I don't work in a public library, I still have reference desk stories. But the pool in this town is so small that I can't share any of my stories here.

Really, though? Those things pale in comparison to going each day to an institution whose work I genuinely support and who seems to genuinely value what I do. Which isn't funny or particularly interesting to read about, but it's true, so there.

Rebirth of the Blog

So, I've been kicking around the idea of bringing back the blog. The hardest part of bringing back the blog, though, is writing the first post. You know, the one where I explain where I was and what I was doing and why I haven't been writing the blog? I'd start it in my head, but then I'd start to think about the fact that Google Reader got shut down, and probably all two of the people who followed me didn't transfer their subscriptions, and anyway, isn't there a new Sherlock trailer to find on the internet?

Then, along comes this article to kick me out of my no-bloggy funk. Go ahead, you can read it. It's short! Wait, who am I to come into your house after a year of silence and make you read NPR articles? Fair point, dear reader. I'll sum up:

You know how at the beginning of calls to customer service, they usually tell you that the call might be recorded for training purposes? And you either forget about it, or at least assume that they aren't referring to the parts where they're playing a Muzak version of "The Boys of Summer"? Well, they're totally recording the whole thing! And they used the recording to judge you!

The study in the article looked at two things: how much people on those calls sweared, and whether they said "please" and "thank you". As a Hoosier, albeit a misplaced one, I was filled with all of the conflicting emotions my homeland usually gives me when I saw Indiana smack dab in the middle of the "Least Courteous" list, while not ranking at the top or bottom of the Cursing list. Hoosiers!We will not curse at you when you make us wait, but neither will we say "thank you" if you end up helping us! We made passive aggressiveness into an art form, you sons of a biscuit!

I should note that Vermont didn't make it onto the list. I don't know what that says. Vermonters are neither repressed enough nor rude enough to make headlines? I didn't get all "social science librarian" with the article, so it could just say that they didn't adjust for population, leaving the second least populated state with little chance of ranking. Who knows?

All of which is to say, I decided to skip the "What I Did on My Blog Vacation" post. Suffice to say, I'm still here, in Vermont, but I'm still thinking about the Midwest. More to come soon, I promise.

A Room of One's Own

Believe it or not, the tiny room pictured above is one of the more exciting developments from our time in Vermont. It's a studio, and it is all mine.

We had a bit of a scramble getting from the town we were living in to Montpelier. We had chosen a town in which to sublet in Vermont thinking that we wanted to either live there or in Burlington. As it turns out, we fell in love with Montpelier, and then, amazingly, I got a job there. Awesome, right? Except for the fact that it is really hard to find apartments here, especially pet-friendly ones, and our sublet was about to run out. We literally saw a place on Tuesday, signed a lease on Wednesday, and moved in on Friday right before our sublet expired on Saturday. We were so happy to have somewhere to live that we tried not to focus on the fact that the place we found was very, very small. 

And it is very, very small. It is a glorified studio apartment, though since it has two rooms and a bathroom, it was advertised as a one-bedroom. We are making it work, but it was very hard at first. It got easier when the Husband found himself studio space. It was actually his idea that I get studio space as well. My loom and yarn are over there, as well as sewing supplies. 

The theory is that I'm going to give the whole weaving thing an actual go, in a space where I won't have to fold up the loom or shove it in the corner every night. The theory is that I'll be a weaver, and maybe actually sell the things I weave, and maybe eventually even make a noticeable portion of my income from it. 

When Virginia Woolf talked about having a room of one's own, she was talking about bringing legitimacy to one's work. The flip side of legitimacy is a sense of responsibility and the fact that it's time to either do the thing you've been talking about or shut up about it. Frankly, it's daunting. We'll see whether in a few months I'm doing the thing or shutting up. I really hope it's the former.

It Happens

The husband and I have settled, finally, in the fine city of Montpelier. We are both gainfully employed. I am not, any longer, a librarian. I am working at a preschool as a Toddler Teacher. In practice, this means I am the assistant teacher under a very cool head teacher in a room full of children aged 12-18 months. 

There are things I like very much about my new career. There are things I miss very much about my old one. Overall, though, I think there is one thing that I can point to as the main difference between the two, and that thing is poop. 

Oh, there was poop at the library, but for me at least, it was mostly in the abstract. I conducted storytimes for many diapered children, and sometimes I'd smell the telltale stink of a poopy diaper, but it was never my problem. Libraries are renowned for providing public bathrooms to any and all, including the type of unsavory character who would spread their solid waste on the walls, but when it happened at my library, I was already home for the day. 

These days, I am pretty much the Poop Queen. At frequent intervals, either me or my co-teacher will say, "I smell poop," and then we will begin the strange ritual of diaper-poking and bottom-smelling until one of us finds the culprit. Often there is more than one culprit, in part because these children eat most of their meals at the same time and are thus on very similar schedules in all parts of their lives. 

All of this was brought home to me in the past week, as a minor stomach bug swept the classroom. As illnesses go, it was nothing major. The afflicted children remained in good spirits and kept their food down. They just had wicked cases of diarrhea. I talked in great detail to mothers and fathers about the contents of their children's diapers, both during and after each child struck ill. In one case, within minutes of meeting a child's aunt, I was talking about his bowel movements to her. 

This is definitely not what I imagined for myself originally, but I'm enjoying it very much. In all honesty, diaper changing is one of my favorite daily tasks, because it is usually nice one-on-one time with each child that is hard to get otherwise in a busy room. Still, though, as I stand and talk earnestly about the texture of a poop, sometimes I would like to hit pause and enjoy a nice long Beavis laugh. So here, in my private space, I have but one thing to say to you: "Poop. Uh huh huh huh."

Thank you. I needed that.

Waiting to land

When we were planning this great move of ours, I expected to feel settled once we arrived in Vermont. After leaving Illinois, we spent nearly a month in a transitory state, spending time in the homes of family and friends. I loved seeing the people, some of whom we now live far from and others who are so much closer now. But I also felt like we were circling and circling and never quite getting to land. I was ready to settle down, and I was so sure that would happen when we arrived in Vermont.

The thing is, though, we're subletting. We picked a Vermont town, the town we most enjoyed when we visited on vacation last year. After trying unsuccessfully to find a permanent place for us to live, we found temporary one. The place is furnished, so we put the majority of our stuff in storage for the summer.

As it turns out, this was lucky. We now know that when we say we don't want to live in a city, we mean we don't want to live in Chicago. "City" doesn't mean quite the same thing in a state where the entire population is less than a quarter of Chicago's.

This is a good thing to learn while finishing off a two-and-a-half month sublet rather than, say, in month 2 of a 12-month lease. We're focused on two cities now, Burlington and Montpelier. In one of those cities (I won't say which, out of a ridiculous desire to avoid jinxing myslf), I have two very strong job leads. I feel so very hopeful about what the rest of the year will bring.

Still, though, I also feel like the circling continues. Where will I be working? Not sure! What sitting will we live in next month? Wait and see! I am aching to settle in and start the process of making myself at home. It will happen soon, but it's getting hard to wait.

In which I interact with real townspeople

Recently while walking our dog Beckett through the village green*, I had the following conversation. I share to prove that even in Vermont, there are Those People.

*Actually it happened near the bus stop, after I had left the green. I, however, would like to pretend I exist solely on the village green for as long as I live in a village with a green.

Random Woman: Oh, that's a nice dog. Is it a chihuahua?

Me: No, he's a fox terrier.

RW: Oh, because he looks a lot like a chihuahua.

Me: Yeah, people say that sometimes. But he's a terrier.

RW: His head is shaped like a chihuahua's. And his neck.

Me: (NOTE: The remainder of my side of the conversation takes place in my head, while in person I smile and nod.) I'm not sure that I can be polite to you anymore.


RW: (As Beckett allows himself to be pet) I let dogs approach me and sniff and decide if they want to interact. That's how I show that I respect them.

Me: Perhaps another way to respect him would be to acknowledge that he's not a chihuahua.

RW: Yeah, sometimes you have to watch out with chihuahuas. Sometimes they just want to bite.

Me: Have you ever actually encountered a chihuahua, or do you just refer to every dog you meet as a chihuahua? Maybe you enrage the dogs by causing identity issues. Maybe they think that while being a chihuahua is certainly not shameful, it is also not what they are and they get mad! Maybe they are just trying to prevent their owners' heads from exploding!

RW: All right, thanks for letting me pet your dog. To someone nearby: Did you see that chihuahua?

Me: Pfff! (It turns out that when your head explodes it just makes a quiet little pfff.)

Huzzah!

So we did it. We officially moved out of Illinois and into Vermont. We took a deliberately roundabout path that brought us to friends in Wisconsin and in Baltimore. (Our suggestion for Maryland's motto, in case the good people of the Maryland marketing board read this, is "Maryland: much prettier than you think it will be.") Finally, though, we've landed in the Green Mountain State. After trying unsuccessfully to find permanent housing from Illinois, we decided to sublet a furnished place here. The thinking was that while it is scary to commit to a year in a place without seeing it, we can live pretty much anywhere for 3 months. The only drawback is that it's been hard to shake the sense that we're on a really long vacation. It's not so much that it's so nice (though we did luck out and get a pretty decent place), but more that living with and using someone else's stuff feels a lot like staying in an inn. Also becuase we're finally living in a place that has multiple appealing restaurants. Also because there is a lovely little waterfall a short walk from our building's front door. And also, it must be said, because we're both still unemployed and our days are open. I've got faith that the last one will work itself out. We made the decision to value where we are over what we're doing for work while there. Having the choice is an advantage of not having kids and of living modestly enough to have accrued savings while both working part-time. Where I am, I can look out the window and see a mountain in the distance, as well as a pub with 17 beers on tap. For the moment at least, the decision seems like a good one.