WHY EAT?

Well, to stay alive, but I find my old habits have snuck back, not in the same form.  I'm not eating a bag of Mrs. Fields or M&M's, but I find sometimes I have a hard time staying away from nuts or a protein bar or other snacks that I have identified as ok.

It's distressing to think I could very easily gain all this weight back.

THE NEW REGIME

Worked as a sub on Fri for a small library that has a new manager.  She scheduled me on the reference desk for the full 4 hours.   Two things about this: this is the new regime as far as subs on the desk and we used to be used with more consideration.

I have heard the horror stories of subs working at libraries where they are working the desks, circulation and reference, for five or six hours at a stretch.  But this is the first time it's happened to me.

 It didn't used to be that way.

There are a couple of small, one-person libraries where you're stuck at the desk, but my experience there that they are not so continually busy that you can find time to eat lunch.  But, yes, technically you don't get a break.

With the cut in allowable sub hours a library can get, they are asking for six or five hour shifts instead of seven or eight.  Which means a sub works the shorter shift with just a fifteen-minute break instead of the longer shirt with an hour break.

Sitting on a library desk for many hours looks so easy but one sub. described it to me as sitting on a complaint desk for six hours.  Not fun.  Of course, that's an exaggeration  Sometimes it is fun, but mostly it's just routine.

And it's exhausting.  Or I think it is.  I have a hard time doing four hours now, not that is was ever easy-peasy.   But, I think everyone who does customer service knows how draining it is to deal with the public for any length of time.  Most of the time, they are fine but you also deal with abuse of one kind or another.  And library work is physically draining, going from one end of the building to another, hauling books or carts of books around.

I was sure the exhaustion was me.  I had major surgery this year and still find my energy levels erratic.  Yesterday, in my regular job, I was on the desk four hours over an eight-hour shift.   Means desk time every other hours - there were only two of us in the branch because one of the regular employees was on vacation and of course we couldn't have a sub for her full hours.

I felt so done in, that I could hardly concentrate on the computer and it took all my energy to focus on the patron's questions.  i work hard at times like that, pretending to be ok and sometimes the acting becomes the reality, especially if the transaction is a pleasant one.

But it is hard to deal with the public for hours at a time, make no mistake.

Well, this is the new regime which also includes the new managers of which there are many.  In the last couple of years, most of the old-school managers have retired.  In fact, now that I think of it, I don't think there's one left.

It seems now that subs are not just considered a substitute for an ill or vacationing staff member, not just covering the desk while someone is at a meeting or a school visit or to make sure there are enough staff to open a branch.  We used to be used humanely, on the desk for two hours, off for one and back on.  On and off all day with jobs like the holds or router to do in-between.

In the good old days, managers worked the desk - also Saturdays and evenings, the same as the rest of us.  The good ones now will take a shift on the desk when it's really, really necessary.

The jobs were saved for us, not given to volunteers or aides, which is what happens now.  Which adds to the impression we have now that subs are an opportunity for the regular staff to get work done off the desk.

You used to feel appreciated.  It's a cold, hard new age at the ole lib these days.  I guess it's time to put up or shut up as they say.

I COULD SPIT

Of all the jobs I haven't gotten, and there are a baker's dozen of them. this last one really frosts my balls, as my mother used to say.  That they hire a young woman without experience into one of the very few full-time positions and one of the rarer than hen's teeth Advanced spots.

At a meeting yesterday am, I sat across from a Deputy Director who claimed that she being a plain spoken individual, wanted us to come into our meetings with respect and the intention of working together.  This meeting was with administration and representatives of the two library  unions.  It is a regular committee that meets to discuss policy questions staff may have.

It was a good meeting and the DD was merely confirming that.  We were all working for the good of the institution.  (Actually, I think of my work on the committee to be for the good of the staff.)

But when the DD spoke I wondered what she would say if I had the guts to bring up the hiring practices, if I asked what the fuck are you people doing?  You signed the MOU, you agreed to do what the arbitrator said you must do, why aren't you?

EARLY MORNING MUSING

I don't go into work until 10 but I wake up at 6:15, my mind full of the latest . Yesterday, I learned that once again the LA-Advanced position had gone to a young woman, N.< who has worked for the library since 2008. What makes it worse is, she had no experience in cataloging or other aspects of Technical Services. Another employee, A., of course older, with years of experience in the same department, did not get the promotion.

Of course, I didn't either. I'm going to write our HR person, who just started with the library about 8 months ago, asking why I did not get the job. I was completely ready to not get the job when I was sure A. would get it. But now that she didn't and someone with less experience in general at the library than me got it, I'm really pissed.

But not surprised. It is quite clear that library administration and the managers along with it, are completely discounting the rules laid down and agreed to by both the union and the library. Every job that has been filled in the last year has been grieved.

As my colleague said last evening, the deputy librarians are not passing down the rules to the managers. Instead of choosing among the most senior, they invariably go with the less. And now they have promoted someone with even less experience than me.

We had a union meeting of the library section. There were only 12 of us but many questions were asked and discussed. The hottest topic was the recent canceling of hours leaving enumerable substitutes without work.

This is something that has affected me as well, although I have a part-time permanent position. But the truth is that basic salary is not enough to support me. I really am questioning myself why I have stuck it out so long.

One of the subjects was the use of volunteers in the libraries and how slowly but surely they appear to be taking over our jobs. The point was made that regular staff are so overworked, with stafffing stretched so thin, that they welcome volunteers doing the work. It seems that they are more valued than we are.

The union reps said they could not grieve or complain for us if we did not tell them what was going on.

One very upsetting report was that the sub hours were cut because subs would not go where the most necessary jobs were, that the cuts were not finiancial but merely vindictive. Subs also reported that they were being chastised for not working more days and going futher than perhaps they wanted to. One person described how she had worked 17 days in a row and was talked into working one more.

This is a new thing. When I started this nonsense did not go on and it is shocking how messed up the thinking is. For instance, there are 12 unfilled Library Assistant positions in the county and who knows how many clerks and librarian jobs. Some libraries have not had a Children's Librarian for two years.

Obviously, if those positions were filled the substitute situation would be mostly solved. Some of the subs would be hired as permanent employees and the number of hours needing coverage would lesson

Of course, this doesn't solve the problem of why subs won't go to certain libraries and it is stupid of administration not to wonder. They seem, to me, to be living in a la-la land. It is too damn bad.

Who Needs to Make a Living?

There is a sense as a library worker that you're involved in a job that is out of the ordinary because it is a job with a higher purpose. Free public libraries are a cornerstone of American democracy. They are a living symbol of the best qualities of civilization.

Yeah, ok. Meanwhile, do I need to go on food stamps?

Don't get me wrong. I love libraries. Have all my life. At times, they have been a refuge and a safety zone. Somewhere I could go that was free, comfortable and safe.

For instance, I moved to New York City when I was first married. It wasn't exactly my idea but i couldn't come up with a better one. The city scared me and I could hardly step outside. My husband went off to his new waiter job and I remember laying in bed thinking there had to some way to get myself up and out.

A vision of the lions outside the New York Public Library building came into my mind. The Library! There had to branches. I looked it up in the phone book, which got me out of bed, and there was, less than a block away, and that got me out of the apartment.

But now, having worked for a library system for all these years, and having struggled financially every step of the way, I kind of resent the attitude that the institution is more important than the people who are part of it.

But maybe it is. On the one hand it's only library work, not the cure for any kind of cancer. On the other hand, maybe the researcher who does, got her love of knowledge from early storytimes

I probably shouldn't have got myself caught up in the whole library mystique. It is very good to be proud of the job, for all the silly stereotypes about libraries and the people who work in them. I am also proud of myself for doing a good job and of the branch where I work. But I would be even prouder if I could get my teeth and car fixed -- I need 2 implants, new air-conditioning, working windows and an oil change. The last thing I'm planning on doing at the next pay period, trusting that the yellow light won't change to red until then!

Life in Libraryland is not without Anxiety

When I first started working as a Library Assistant, my eldest niece commented that the work "must be so peaceful."

This has made me laugh because, of course, any job where you deal with the public is not peaceful - at all! But nowadays, working in Libraryland is kind of miserable what with cuts, layoffs and libraries closing.

I have been an LA for nearly 10 years but although I'm a "permanent employee" in a large county library, I am a 20 hour part-timer. Technically I'm 20/40 which means I can work 20 extra hours at one of the 25 libraries in the system. This in addition to my regular schedule at my home library.

The good points: I have a home library, can do some interesting work from time to time, get excellent health benefits, get paid sick leave and vacation and very soon will be eligible for retirement. My 10 years is 5 in county time, if you know what I mean.

Meanwhile, nobody can live in the Bay Area on 20 hours so the extra hours makes it possible to pay rent, buy food, put gas in the car and in the past even go on vacations, buy Christmas presents, and shop consignment stores.

The downside? Can't pay for big dental or automobile bills. And I'm always worried about money. In fact, it seems to me that I spend a good deal of time raising money. I sell stuff on ebay, take things down to pawn, borrow from a payday loan place.

For a long time, it was worth scrounging because this is the first job I've ever had that I really, really liked. In fact, I would say at times I loved it.

Or they did but for the past year, in order to save staff being laid off, my system has been cutting those extra hours. I was relieved when I saw my tax return that I wasn't imagining that I had less cash; I did. But now, in the middle of 2010, things are getting brutal.

In fact, this evening our automated substitute program phoned me to cancel two jobs in July. This leaves me with one 5 hour job and, guess what, that won't do it.

It's scary at my age facing this situation. Part of the situation is that I can't quit because I need the health care, but the paycheck won't support me.