As she leaned over to retrieve the pile of books I had finished for the library's summer reading program, Miss Hawks said sternly, "You couldn't possibly have read that many books in a week."
I had. I don't remember if I tried to convince her of that or not, but the scornful disbelief in her voice has stuck with me all these years.
Miss Hawks was the fierce protector of the library's books - I was a grubby-fingered kid who loved to read.
I suspect she saw me as the enemy.
But that was then - this is now.
Today the shushing, bespectacled and remote librarian is as obsolete as the card catalog. Miss Hawks has been replaced by what a recent New York Times News Service story called the "modern librarian," a hip information specialist. These new librarians are on the cutting edge of technology, dedicated to dispensing information far beyond what's in books and concerned about reaching out to readers, rather than turning them off. Today's librarians are connecting their customers to music and movies as well as literature, even in the Internet-based virtual world of Second Life.
Case in point is librarian Linda Absher, who deplores sensible shoes and really doesn't care if your books are overdue - at least when you confess it to her while she's shopping at Raley's.
Asked how she became a librarian, she responds: "Where do I begin? Is it the glamour, the fame, the fact that I can wield a storytime sock puppet and answer reference questions at the same time? Or is it because during my employment at the Nut Tree, I spent much of my time explaining to out-of-staters why 'Vacaville' is not Spanish for 'cow town'?"
You'll find Absher at www.lipsticklibrarian.com, a sassy little Web site that spits out her e-mail address when you click on "Talk to a Librarian."
Absher was raised in Fairfield. Now the public access services librarian for Portland State University in Portland, Ore., says in an e-mail that the career of a librarian suits her perfectly.
"I have to switch my attention constantly - what other career provides me the opportunity to answer questions ranging from "Where does the word 'Asia' come from?" to 'What's the pope's telephone number?' all within an hour?"
To meet a quintessential "new" librarian in the flesh, drop by the Fairfield Civic Center Library and spend some time with Sarah Krygier, who grew up using the library, where she is now a young adult librarian.
On a recent January day, the line was four deep in front of the information desk where Krygier conferred with a mother about an online tutoring site. She rotates between that spot, the computer center, the children's section and the front door, where she greets readers and directs traffic.
If she wasn't born to be a librarian, she was led to it, Krygier says. A graduate of Saint Patrick High School in Vallejo and the University of California, Berkeley, she found her career niche during a stint as a library director's assistant. She earned her master's degree in library and information sciences at San Jose State University.
"A really good friend told me, 'I never put you as a librarian, but now that you are, I see it,' "she says.
Krygier's duties illustrate how she and her counterparts are "putting the rarin' back in librarian," as the Web site www.librarian.net puts it. Her tasks include:
• Conducting an annual college night with parents, students and representatives from area colleges.
• Visiting Sem Yeto Continuation High School each month, reading to youngsters in the school's daycare center and talking with young mothers about college, careers and related subjects.
• Supervising the monthly Teens Read Book Club
• Making monthly visits to special education classes at Armijo High School to read aloud and lead an activity.
• Visiting Fairfield's high schools and middle schools ("as many as will have me") during the year to familiarize students with library resources.
• Coordinating free PSAT and SAT practice exams and results seminars.
• With other librarians, teaching adult computer classes and doing seasonal fun activities with children.
A bit outside the box for a librarian?
Not really, says Krygier.
"Books are tremendously important - I push books," she says. "But we have to let teens know there's more than that (in a library). They will come to reading on their own."
Kevin Tolley, a library associate at the Vacaville Public Library - Town Square, works with teens in a writing club that has an online literary magazine. Mingling with young people who like to be creative is one of the best parts of his job, says Tolley, who has a master's degree in anthropology. "It's kind of fun - the kids are pretty impressive."
Nefertari Guice, also a library associate, works at the Fairfield Cordelia Library and, like Tolley, finds working with teens a highlight. Game nights and SAT prep classes "get them to see the library in a different light," she says, adding that game night prizes are books. "We tie in reading with recreational programs."
These "new librarians" do not necessarily agree with the New York Times premise that librarians have changed radically. "Librarians and libraries have always been progressive, have always used the latest technology," says Krygier.
Adds Guice: "I think the evolution of the profession has more to do with technology than with people. The core values, the skill set, is still the same. We're trying to link people with information. In the old days, it was books and card catalogs. Today it's still linking, but we're using advanced technology - different tools."
Those techie tools, she adds, probably are attracting more young people to the profession.
Tolley, too, champions his professional progenitors. Asked what differentiates him from them, he replies: "I know some of those stereotypical librarians and I would not like to set myself too far apart from them - they're very nice people."
Serena Enger, supervising librarian at Fairfield Civic Center Library, notes that some older librarians were "miffed" at the newspaper story's implication that youngsters have revolutionized their field.
"Librarians and libraries have always provided outreach to all kinds of people," she says. Libraries have always been a place where uncomfortable topics and trends could be explored; a place that champions different points of view.
Where libraries were once a warehouse for books, they are now a space to be used for gathering, with meeting rooms, study rooms, and so on, says Guice.
Concurring, Enger says, "Across the U.S., libraries are often the only community center and often the only place for nonadults to hang out."
Still, Krygier finds her profession has changed in at least one way. In the last 10 years, library staffs have definitely become friendlier, she says.
She remembers getting plenty of dirty looks from library gatekeepers when she was a youngster. "They didn't always like me - I asked a lot of questions," she says.
That was, no doubt, when she encountered her Miss Hawks.
She recalls a summer when the library rewarded young readers with a free book for each book read and reviewed. A voracious reader, Krygier read 30 books and wrote 30 reviews during the required time.
When she went to collect her reward, the librarian questioned her ability to cover that much literary ground so speedily, and suggested that perhaps Krygier had read some books at an earlier time.
"The next year," says Krygier, "they limited the number of books you could read to 10."
Source: The Reporter.com
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