we owe it to each other to tell stories
I use you, O patient flist, to mentally draft my application essay. Which I am still trying to narrow down -- I think I want it to be a sort of manifesto for my planned career (and therefore my educational goals), both as a writer and as a librarian. I have all of these really amazing things that I want to do as a librarian, things that being a librarian would give me, I think, a unique opportunity to do, especially in the area of -- I don't want to say mentoring, because, um, I am me, and I am a mess, and not very mentor-able, but -- sheltering? shepherding? listening to? young people, and quite possibly any people. Because I was a confused, depressed, lonely teenager who just needed people to understand and value her, and I had a lot of unique opportunities that kept me from going insane or losing myself, but I've seen a lot of young people who didn't get those opportunities, and don't have anyone to listen to them, and didn't grow up knowing that popularity, whatever the plague that means, isn't so important, and that one should be more inclined to wonder than to mock; bright, friendly, clever, glorious young people who never had anyone show them that they needn't be satisfied with the status quo, that they can and should use their talents, reach out, try hard things, and do whatever the plague they want even if it isn't "cool" or "normal". People who could be so much more amazing and fulfilled if someone would not just tell, but show them that some things are just weird cultural trappings and they can think beyond them. And maybe reaching these kids through being a librarian sounds like a really weird idea, like, come on, you could be a counsellor or something, right? Well, no, I couldn't, because I would be terrible at that, and also because... I don't know, maybe because with being a librarian you get to make connections with everyone, and invite people to talk and be listened to, and there are no obligations or politics about it. And because I'd have opportunities to talk to the boy who just needs someone to tell him that his life is too valuable for him to take it, yes, but also the opportunity to reach the girl who just needs the validation of reading a story where a girl gets to do something transcendent and amazing; gets to choose her own fate.
And this isn't why I first thought, hey, I should be a librarian, either -- it came after the hand-flailing, dizzying geeky glee accompanying the notion of working with books all day, and cataloguing them, and reading them, and recommending them, and being their care-taker, and having graduate courses like The History of Printing, and then helping people find the books that they need, the ones that maybe they didn't even know that they needed. It just sort of... grew. I keep thinking about libraries as a sanctuary of Story, and what that means: you have books, absolutely, but you also have newspapers and magazines and historical documents; you have films, and music; you have art. You have people meeting for book discussions, and sending things into poetry contests. Even my little mouse-coloured library has these things represented in some way, even if the book discussions or author signings are all middle-aged-women unchallenging tepid things. So the library can -- or at least could -- serve as a nexus of ideas and discussion about stories, and about telling our stories, and listening to the stories of others: communicating. And I've seen a little of this, too, although living in a small town with a very small-town library where not a lot happens has made it so that most of this "seeing" happens from far away, observing other people's experiences. And I think of so many people I've met who just needed to talk, to be listened to; and all of the people I've known who could benefit enormously by hearing stories outside their normal experience (oh wait, that would be all of us, wouldn't it?) . And I think about how I was an often lonely child who grew up with stories when I didn't have people around me. And I think: this is what I need to do.
A lot of reasons that I grew up knowing that being me, being a girl, a Christian, a daughter, a rebel, an idealist, was okay, was because I had stories. They gave me examples, they showed me where I might go wrong, where I should be careful, and they showed me that I could be loved and valued. They gave me other people to listen to and to understand, and because reading a story is to let yourself think inside of another person's mind, to empathise, to consider points of view other than your own. I wouldn't claim to be on the shortlist for any Empathetic Person of the Year Awards, but because of this background of stories and listening, I'm more able to listen to others, more understanding of the simple fact that I should.
Everything keeps coming down to this Neil Gaiman quote, I think, which has become the core tenet of my personal life philosophy. "Everybody has a secret world inside of them," he says. "All of the people of the world, I mean everybody. No matter how dull and boring they are on the outside, inside them they've all got unimaginable, magnificent, wonderful, stupid, amazing worlds. Not just one world. Hundreds of them. Thousands, maybe."
As a writer, as a librarian, I want to give people the opportunities to open up their worlds, express themselves, understand others. I want to, as Madeleine L'Engle wrote in A Circle of Quiet, give them a self. And give them the understanding that everyone else has a self, a magnificent, wonderful, stupid, amazing world: the understand that we should listen to each other. That we should tell stories. Neil Gaiman also says that "we owe it to each other to tell stories". To each other, and to ourselves.
-- I still have a lot of sorting out and defining and solidifying to do -- far too much of what's going on in my head on this subject is too vague-- [needs citation], you know? Oy.
And this isn't why I first thought, hey, I should be a librarian, either -- it came after the hand-flailing, dizzying geeky glee accompanying the notion of working with books all day, and cataloguing them, and reading them, and recommending them, and being their care-taker, and having graduate courses like The History of Printing, and then helping people find the books that they need, the ones that maybe they didn't even know that they needed. It just sort of... grew. I keep thinking about libraries as a sanctuary of Story, and what that means: you have books, absolutely, but you also have newspapers and magazines and historical documents; you have films, and music; you have art. You have people meeting for book discussions, and sending things into poetry contests. Even my little mouse-coloured library has these things represented in some way, even if the book discussions or author signings are all middle-aged-women unchallenging tepid things. So the library can -- or at least could -- serve as a nexus of ideas and discussion about stories, and about telling our stories, and listening to the stories of others: communicating. And I've seen a little of this, too, although living in a small town with a very small-town library where not a lot happens has made it so that most of this "seeing" happens from far away, observing other people's experiences. And I think of so many people I've met who just needed to talk, to be listened to; and all of the people I've known who could benefit enormously by hearing stories outside their normal experience (oh wait, that would be all of us, wouldn't it?) . And I think about how I was an often lonely child who grew up with stories when I didn't have people around me. And I think: this is what I need to do.
A lot of reasons that I grew up knowing that being me, being a girl, a Christian, a daughter, a rebel, an idealist, was okay, was because I had stories. They gave me examples, they showed me where I might go wrong, where I should be careful, and they showed me that I could be loved and valued. They gave me other people to listen to and to understand, and because reading a story is to let yourself think inside of another person's mind, to empathise, to consider points of view other than your own. I wouldn't claim to be on the shortlist for any Empathetic Person of the Year Awards, but because of this background of stories and listening, I'm more able to listen to others, more understanding of the simple fact that I should.
Everything keeps coming down to this Neil Gaiman quote, I think, which has become the core tenet of my personal life philosophy. "Everybody has a secret world inside of them," he says. "All of the people of the world, I mean everybody. No matter how dull and boring they are on the outside, inside them they've all got unimaginable, magnificent, wonderful, stupid, amazing worlds. Not just one world. Hundreds of them. Thousands, maybe."
As a writer, as a librarian, I want to give people the opportunities to open up their worlds, express themselves, understand others. I want to, as Madeleine L'Engle wrote in A Circle of Quiet, give them a self. And give them the understanding that everyone else has a self, a magnificent, wonderful, stupid, amazing world: the understand that we should listen to each other. That we should tell stories. Neil Gaiman also says that "we owe it to each other to tell stories". To each other, and to ourselves.
-- I still have a lot of sorting out and defining and solidifying to do -- far too much of what's going on in my head on this subject is too vague-- [needs citation], you know? Oy.