New job – Eek!

Hi all. Another long time in between posts, I know. But now I can finally say that there has been a reason for the long cold nights in between writing: I got a new job! The process has taken a few months from application, to interviews, to visits, to giving notice and finally, to yesterday, my first day.

While I am very sad to leave my job at the Nevins Memorial Library in Methuen – and I love all of you wonderful Nevins people and will see you soon* – I am very excited to be in my position as Teen/Reference Librarian at Memorial Hall Library in Andover. It’s another step for me in my career and I am the most excited about working with a team of YA librarians. I am one of two full-time YA librarians and there are also two-part time staffers who work in the teen room! Wow! Being a department of one at Nevins really taught me a lot about how I work – sometimes very last-minute, not the best at planning, but very motivated and liking to stay busy with projects and building my own support system, especially cross departmentally – but I am so excited to be able to work with other YA people. Just to have more people knowing what’s going on day-to-day in teen services and being able to work with others’ strengths is a huge bonus for me.

Yesterday went well other than a brief panicky moment when all the teens on the computers needed more time and I realized I didn’t actually know how to do that. One teen got impatient but another one said, “Give her a break. It’s her FIRST day!” Instant favorite teen right there. I was really nervous about messing up in general and I know that I will in the days, weeks, and months ahead. I’m sure I’ll accidentally hang up on someone or mess up a computer or local history question. Or any number of things, and being okay with that is something I’m going to have to work on. Everyone seems really nice and helpful and I’m hoping it’s going to be a great fit.

I’ll keep you updated on my goals and events, but I anticipate the next month or so I may be infrequently posting while I get my feet under me. Thanks to everyone who supported me through this process and thanks to everyone at the Nevins for helping me so much professionally.

A final note: if you had told me my first year in grad school when I was working a handful of jobs trying to add up to full-time and eating the grad school diet of peanut M&Ms from the vending machine that I’d be working at Andover and that I’d make myself a kale smoothie for lunch (just on the line between good and disgusting, just how I like it…), I’d probably have laughed in your face. It’s nice to know classes and work are paying off.

*Probably very soon. I left my Abraham Lincoln Presidential Library mug in the break room and need it back. It’s my work library mug. My home library mug is a mug from the Phillips Library at the Peabody Essex Museum. I will freely admit I have too many mugs. (I ranked my top four favorite mugs the other day and that’s perhaps a quarter of the mugs we have: 1. Star Trek mug 2. Royal Wedding mug 3. Phillips Library mug and 4. Vintage Steak n’ Shake mug. I could rank drinking glasses and bowls, too, but I won’t. I’ll save your sanity if not my own.)