Yes, I wrote that book

I'll never forget the day when a child and her mother brought one of my books up to the Information Desk (where I was stationed) and asked if that book was any good. Picture me standing there with my name tag in full view. What could I say but - "yes, it's a good book. I know the author. She does deep research for her books."  

Still waiting to this day for them (or anyone) to notice that it's MY book. (books) In fact, when I did talks at libraries about writing and sat only 7 feet from the poster that had my picture on it -- nobody asked it that was me. 

One person brought her children to my talk because she thought the speaker/ author was a black writer. 

(this happened several times. I guess I photograph as an African American - which would surprise my English and German ancestors.) 

Or maybe it's because I wrote about some of my favorite people - who happened to be black. Louis Armstrong, Duke Ellington - I grew up listening to their music and was a musician myself.  

Stories come at awkward times

  I was driving to work, thinking about the fact that it was my co-worker's birthday and I didn't know what to get her when suddenly words came. And more words. And it was a poem. 

And I knew I wouldn't remember it by the time I got to my workplace, so I pulled into a side street and WROTE it down. Success!  

(and yes , reader, she liked it.)

Where's the delete button?

 in the years before laptops, when we visited my parents in another state, my husband would get so frustrated because of no access to his computer.  

One day he sat there, holding a pencil and paper pad, and moaned because he didn't know where the 'delete' button was.  

(I walked over and pointed to the eraser .)

History of computers in libraries

 I worked for large Maryland libraries from 1969 on, and we switched from card catalog to various forms of microfilm in the 1970s. Converted to a clunky computer system in the later 1970s. It was actually intended for check out and check in , but librarians (mostly my husband and me but others chimed in too) insisted it would be very useful for librarians to quickly find things for our customers , so librarians were 'allowed' to use it.  

The first computer system was sooooo slow compared to today, but so much quicker than flipping microfilm back and forth. (a single modern web page uses more bytes than our whole computer catalog used in those days.)

It was years before libraries could afford to install computers for library customers. At first librarians held classes in computer use. Later on a lot of libraries had 'computer volunteers ' who would come in and help computer newbies learn how to use them.

Best place to write

Writer's life:

Go to writer's retreat.

Good food and conversation.

Revise several manuscripts.

Read one at the last day's gathering. (We all did a reading of something we had been working on that week.)

Now sending it out.

Crossing fingers and toes that somebody buys it. 

Mothers need wands (and so do kids)

 I just saw a Facebook post where a dad had gone out into the woods, cut a twig from a tree, and painted it as a wand for his kids to give to their mom.  Happy Mother's Day!

It reminded about the time when I had a Harry Potter event at our library and we went out into the nearby woods and cut ourselves and for the children, "wands" from the trees, using mostly dead twigs when we could find them. then went inside the library and practiced levitating balloons with our 'wands."

Things people think about librarians

The head of our Friends of the Library (for our branch library) has said many weird things to us.  

1) Why do you have three expensive librarians with college degrees here at the Information desk. (we actually had three desks side by side) He insisted he could hire some high school Honor students to sit there and look things up on the computer and answer questions. (luckily the branch manager pulled him aside to talk to him.)

2) When I brought one of my picture books that I had written in to share with the staff, He picked it up, casually flipped through it, and said, "It must not have taken you long to write this. An hour? What is it? a few hundred words?" (it took3-4 years or more to write, get it bought by a publisher, go through the revision process, wait for the illustrator to finish the illustrations, and wait for the printing of it.) 

3) "I love Librarians! I wish you were open on Friday nights and Sundays too, to make getting here more convenient for us to get books." The branch manager looked at him. After a minute she said, "I don't think you love librarians if you want us to work those hours.