The American Library Association would like to remind you that there are 16,543 libraries in the U.S., while the total number of McDonald’s is 13,727.
Timeless Welsh poetry or a Super-sized Coke equal to the calories of half a chicken?
Substitute whatever reading material applies to you best, and keep on voting yay! on those millages. Don’t forget that if you’re away from home, especially traveling, and need to check your email, you can stop in to any public library in America for free Internet access. Why pay at a Starbucks, besides, some libraries have their own cafes, too? And remember that every child in your world has a free, safe play space at the library with multiple programs and story times every week. They also have child-safe computer stations.
And when you need Consumer Reports, like we all do from time to time, your library is guaranteed to have it, and hundreds more magazines. Need to know which businesses in your community construct steeples for your church building project? Call the library, you don’t need to call everyone in the yellow pages. Businesses have local directories they give to the libraries for this purpose. Businesses know: people ask at the library.
Tired of your same old-same old recipes and don’t have dolla-dollas to spend on new cookbooks? Go check out 20 from the library and thumb your way through them.
Confused by the consumer health information you’re finding online? Terrifyingly negative patient message boards, articles by and for doctors that you can’t decipher, Web sites whose sponsors look to be drug companies and you’re thinking, “how reliable is this??” Just ask at the library. They have paid, reliable health information databases at a variety of levels of intensity (my personal favorite? Health and Wellness Resource Center with Alternative Health).
Want to email your parents and they don’t have a computer or know how to set up a free account? Their local library probably has a basic computer skills course, and if they have a larger library, they may have a tech floater in the public access area who can show them how to set up an account. If not, they can ask the librarian. We live for this, we really do. Showing an older person how to set up a Yahoo account and emailing or IMing them across the room until they get the hang of it makes our day.
Your child says casually over dinner they have a report due on President Hoover tomorrow? Guide them through their research at child-specific databases – guaranteed information with no advertising and the reading level plainly displayed so you can get just what you need without keywording Google and assuming the top few pages are the best the Internet has to offer. Free stuff is great, but there is better, and your library paid for it for you. Check out SIRS Discoverer for elementary-aged kids.
Many libraries serve as default child-care centers. My friend A. works at a library that is located across the street from the town middle school. At 3, dozens (and I do mean DOZENS) of children descend on the library and stay there until their parents get off work. The library provides activities, watches out for bullying, and maintains conduct standards. And all those little tweens? Future millage voters.
And, of course, want to read? Hardcovers can come in at over $25. Check it out from your local library first, see if its worth adding to your personal library. And vote yay! on those millages.
OK, at first I meant only to post those two little opening paragraphs. My friend A (different A.) sent me that figure and I wanted to blog it. Then I got going. I love my profession. When I went to library school I thought, “I’ll have a career I can be proud of, in every personal, social, and professional setting, for the rest of my life.” I didn’t realize how devoted I would become to librarianship.
