Library card aversion

 

I don't particularly like making library cards for people. There's certainly nothing terrible about it all that I can point to. When I'm doing it it's not like I'm screaming in my head "This is agony!" But the whole thing is procedural, repetitive and consumes an above average amount of time for any desk interaction at my library. So I don't like it. In fact, if someone were to come up to me at the desk right now, interrupting my beautiful essay writing, I probably would scream in my head: "This is agony!" But I would only do that at the moment of interruption, at the dawning realization. Once we were on to the registering I might go on to have a perfectly nice time making the library card for our hopeful new library user. Maybe it's like that scene in the beautiful movie "About Time" where the main character brings his (future) wife to his parents' enchanting home on a cliff over a beach. In preparation for the day he tells his future wife not to agree to tea, but then his mom offers the inevitable tea and his future wife agrees, and our main character says something like "Christ, there's the whole day then."

At which point this bunch of delightful people all sit around on the beach all afternoon having tea and crumpets.

Like what else were you planning to do?

But now I may have gone too far here having analogized my getting a library card for a library patron to having tea and crumpets on a gorgeous private beach with lovely people.

I have become reasonably convinced that everyone in my professional position dislikes getting people library cards as well. It's the little signs that give it away: when people happen to walk away from the desk to take care of something else, or the stories patrons tell me about why someone wouldn't get them a library card somewhere else. There are always tells about the jobs that people don't like in a work environment like mine; things that mysteriously don't get done at every possible opportunity.

Because I don't like creating library cards I have become acutely sensitive to reading whether a person is coming to the desk to ask to get a library card. Often I can spot these people clear across the library, reading subtle tells of their body language. Most people don't even need to speak to me for me to know that they are going to want a library card. But people are strange, and sometimes I let down my guard.

For instance earlier today someone came to me at the desk and said "I just have a super quick question."

I love super quick questions!

I am phenomenal at super quick questions!

"Can I get a library card?" He asked.

Arrrrrggghhhhhhhhh! Agony!