Hand Sanitizer

Who would've thought we'd get a full half year into this Pandemic before we sat down and had a serious discussion about hand sanitizer?

I heard hand sanitizer is just a stopgap until you can do a proper handwashing. What happens with hand sanitizer is you throw a cocktail party in your hands for the virus until they get so drunk they all pass out. This is okay for awhile, but only until they groggily wake up in your hands, look blearily around, and then try to work out how to kill you.

It's just their way.

Oh, disclaimer. This isn't science.

At my library we have three kinds of hand sanitizer.

1. A weird paste-like substance provided early on by the county in a pipe stand dispenser that no right-minded person has ever used a second time. Ever.

2. The nice Purell Gel that is the last of our pre Covid cache from a large order in January or February. We lack the pull to ever get anymore of this stuff. Ever.

3. A mysterious, watery liquid that has been put into our Purell bottles and runs all over everything when one squirts it out.

This third, our main hand sanitizer, is not as bad as it sounds. I like to clean things by heavily saturating paper towels in it. I find its smell agreeably boozy.


And so, in conclusion:

1. Wash your hands anyway, as soon as you can.

2. If still unclear on any of this well researched scientific examination of all things related to hand sanitizer (Disclaimer: this isn't science), simply reread. Or, skip to...

3. You must be doing something right. You have not died of Coronavirus!

The desk again

Lately I have been out at the front entry desk of the library for an hour every early evening. I have been telling you all about it here in this very blog, I mean whenever I'm not invading the personal space of butterflies or astounding you with pictures of...

chickens.

I sit here at this desk and wave people into the library. When they leave with a book I say to them:

"Come back when you've read all the words in that one!"

It invariably grows quiet and I watch the flag blow around in the wind outside. Sometimes it rains. Once it rained and I told you all about it.

Sometimes I get real quiet and calm here. Then I see crows screwing around on the antenna of the tall building across the street and I get kind of...

happy.

I've gotta admit, I'm just killing it at this job. They could pay me a fortune to do it and I'd still be worth it.

But the thing is...

I'd even do this job for just what they pay me right now.

Library lobby greeter

Sometimes under our current set-up at my library we library workers are scheduled to staff an entry desk in the lobby. There we act as a sort of greeter/explainer/traffic control. We don't have a computer out there, and we're fairly remote from everything else in the library, and it can get pretty quiet on that distant desk at times.

I love it to pieces.

However some of my colleagues have complained about it being boring.

I want to help my co-workers be as happy as me, so I suggest they do what I do when I'm stationed in the lobby: 



1. Think up hilarious jokes for the library patrons when they arrive at our totally empty library, like:

     A. I'm sorry but we're at our full capacity of zero so you'll have to wait until someone leaves before you can go in.

Or

     B. Are you here to pick up a hold or are you here for our Chinese Buffet?


2. Draw bug hearts and self portraits all over our promotional literature.

I'd be delighted to show anyone how to draw a bug heart, but no one has ever asked.


3. Explain everything to everyone with lots of detail.

That's what I'm doing right now and look how much fun we're having!


4. Gather wool.

I'm pretty happy just gathering, but taking up knitting is always an option.

Shock doctrine at the library

Several years ago Naomi Klein wrote a brilliant book called The Shock Doctrine. The main thesis, poorly expressed by me, is that in times of crisis, disaster, and upheaval, the powerful and their agents use the vulnerability and chaos of the time to push through autocratic, kleptocratic, and sometimes violent power grabs and policies that, under normal circumstances, could not succeed. So in the immediate aftermath of something like 9-11 unwholesome actors were able to ram through a vast array of policies and institutions increasing government surveillance and abridging personal freedoms, most of which had nothing to do with the issues and security problems of 9-11 itself.

All of that is by way of saying that my library is sadly experiencing some shock doctrine of its own in the disaster and instability of the Covid-19 Pandemic. Ours is coming at the hands of the County we belong to.

Over the past five or ten years the County has taken an increasing interest in my library. It has taken over large parts of building maintenance, computer systems, and personnel management, all apparently with an eye to increasing their bureaucratic footprint. And indeed everything they have touched has been inefficient, unresponsive, self-aggrandizing, and edging on the Kafkaesque. But fortunately, to a large degree, the main, open, friendly, and positive function of the library has been left alone.

Until the pandemic.

The County has now rammed through job training, seized library territory, taken over our spaces, installed external staff, and commandeered traditional library functions like Internet usage and access to computers. When one walks into our library now one no longer walks into a library, but rather encounters a large Service Center sign and checks in with a County Navigator who knows little about the library that 98 percent of the people are visiting for, and, oddly, doesn't seem to know all that much about the County Services they're "Navigating" to either.

All of this has been done with little to no coordination with the Library, and indeed the accommodation has all been one way- we operate the library strictly around the systems the County plants into it, and we adapt to the challenges they impose and mitigate the structural problems left in their wake.

I am prone to muse darkly on why the County does all this. Surely their managerial self-importance has blotted out every last shred of their effectiveness and community contribution. I think they must understand on some level that the library is generally admired, well-regarded, and popular, and they are not. They must think that by cramming their obtuse County Bureaucracy into the library they can absorb a little of the affection and respect that will be all around them just by being here.

Of course it doesn't work like that. All they really have to offer here is the possibility of giving the people cause to like the library less.

I can see this all is pretty sad, but since our miserable library curbside pick up ended and was replaced by a vastly more efficient, "in library" self serve hold pick up system I am happy enough here at the library once again. And so in these good spirits I have room to hold out hope- hope that eventually the County will lose interest as it so often does, and retreat, or if not retreat exactly, instead fling on to some other pointless shiny project.

Or, perhaps more realistically, barring that, I'll simply get used to it:

The library will be a little bit the worse for it, but we will carry on, slightly diminished maybe, but a survivor, a force for good, weathering yet another storm in the World.

Such weird birds!

Dear Clerkmanifesto:


Recently, while perusing one of your blogposts, I came across a reference to "weird birds". You also suggested that you had obtained some photographs of these "weird birds".

I would like to see a photograph of one of these "weird birds".

I am a weird bird aficionado.

I am all about WEIRD BIRDS!



Thanks,


A reader






Dear Reader:


Oh, sure. Let me just take a look in my "pictures of birds" folder.

Is this it?

Dear Clerkmanifesto:

No. I don't think it could be this.  I think that's just a woodpecker. I mean it's nice, a very thoughtful looking bird, but it's not weird.

Are you sure that's the one you meant?

A reader

Dear Reader:

Oh. Let me see.

Weird, weird, weird, weird, weird, weird...

Ah, here it is. This must be it!

Dear Clerkmanifesto:



Whoa.


Yes.

That's it.

That is one weird bird!




Thank you.





A reader









Dear Reader:



You're welcome.

It turns out it's a chicken!








Dear Clerkmanifesto:


No way!











 
Dear Reader:


I know.






 
Dear Clerkmanifesto:


Crazy!






 
Dear Reader:


And fluffy.





 
Dear Clerkmanifesto:


Crazy and fluffy!

Bad luck

Currently at my library you can request things online, or over the phone. You are notified when it comes in for you. And then, during any of our many open hours, you can come in, pick up your holds off of the request shelves, and check them out at a self check out or with a plexiglass protected library worker. There is no browsing collection. There is nowhere to roam. There is nowhere to hang out. There are just lots and lots of requested items that you can come in and pick up.

When people come to pick up their holds, even though the area for it is fairly large and spread out, we limit capacity to five at a time. A couple or even a family merely counts as one for our purposes in this method. And though we have a steady flow of library patrons, we almost never reach our capacity of five. Sometimes we'll have a busy run, but it is not uncommon for a day or two to go by without ever having to tell a patron to wait at the gates for another patron to exit.

So when I was in the front lobby this evening, and the library was growing quiet, it did not seem at all likely I would have to pay much attention to how many people were in the library.

Someone came in and I explained the hold system and sent them through. Another came and knew the system well already. A mother and child came through. Someone wanted a library card and I sent them to the front desk. It was getting exciting. No one was leaving yet. A couple came and knew the routine. We were at capacity!

If only someone would come.

I was on the edge of my seat.

Then someone arrived. It was a miracle.

"Unfortunately we're at our maximum capacity. If you'd please just wait on the circle at the gate you can go in when the next person leaves." I said.

The patron took it pretty phlegmatically.

"This almost never happens." I added. "It's like you've won a reverse lottery."

"I've got time." The person replied peaceably.

I guess there are a lot worse reverse lotteries a person could win these days.

While the sun shines

The flowers are blooming. The sun is shining. The wind is calm. The butterflies are singing their super quiet song. The temperature is soft and pleasant. I haven't broken any of my new camera toys yet. And the squirrels, oh man, the squirrels have been practicing their smiles since March!

So I go out with my camera and take pictures.

Pictures of bugs. Pictures of dead flowers in front of old postcards. Pictures of weird birds, such weird birds. Pictures of smiling squirrels.

Pictures of Summer.

Would you like to see?

Me too! But I don't have time to show you right now.

I have to take pictures.

Winter is coming.

William Morris redux

Among the wide range of photographic materials I have bought, scrounged, and gathered is a book of postcards of William Morris wallpaper patterns from the 1800's. I was immediately smitten with these postcards and took a bunch of pictures, in our apartment, of various bits of flowers sitting on them. Then I put those pictures up here on clerkmanifesto and imagined someone might say:

"Neat."

But no one said neat.

Most of the time, indeed quite close to all the time, no one says "Neat" around here, and I simply roll with it. But this time I looked at the post with the William Morris postcard pictures in them to see for myself if I personally thought "neat".

I might have thought "neat" if I stuck to the one or two best pictures, but mostly I did think they could be better, more striking pictures. I decided my postcards needed to go out in the world and meet some real flowers, growing out of the ground, glowing in the morning sun. 

But I didn't want to hurt my postcards!

So I came up with a solution.

My solution was to risk it! 

The fact of the matter is that I have grown so rich I could, in an emergency, afford to buy another book of William Morris postcards.

That's a relief then.

Therefore I took the following pictures, outside, of the various neighbors' flowers in front of my William Morris postcards. 

Then the sky rumbled and it looked about to rain, so I ran home, clutching my precious William Morris postcards.

If these pictures aren't neat I suppose I can just try something else later.

How the rain falls

I'm sitting at the library reception desk watching a perfectly beautiful Summer evening rain. It's heavy and silver and falls pure straight down in a windless sky, like in a Peanuts Cartoon where Linus and Charlie Brown discuss the meaning of life.

The rain always sounds best to me falling on the roof of the library.

In this phase of the pandemic at the library we no longer do curbside pickup. People instead come into the library (five people at a time maximum), get their books off the request shelves, and then use the self check out kiosks to check them out. It's all as peaceful now as curbside was relentlessly miserable.

And suddenly I remember with some accuracy one of those philosophical Peanuts cartoons:

Charlie Brown and Linus walk along in a heavy, straight downpour. Charlie Brown quotes the Bible saying that the rain falls on the just and the unjust alike. Linus thinks about this awhile, then he says "That's a good system."

Sure.

Okay.

More of my journeys across the aisles

Increasingly concerned about the intense divisiveness in my country I vowed to do my part in trying to heal the nation's wounds. And though my first attempt to reach across the aisle didn't go particularly well (everyone was apparently in a different building altogether), I don't see that as a reason to give up. If we are to bridge the terrible divide in America some of us must be willing to commit to making the first gesture. Some of us must be willing to give ground, to compromise, and to reach across the aisle for as long as it takes to meet another hand.

And so from my position out here on the left I do that which I have in the past refused to do:

In the interest of peace in America I am, and I can't believe I'm saying it, moving right!

I move right past all these seats. I am going all the way to the other side. It's a lot of seats!

I've never been this far right before.

Seat, seat, seat, seat. Finally! 

Here I am at the aisle.

I extend my hand.

I said:

I EXTEND MY HAND.

Hmm. You know what? I don't think anyone's on the other side.

Okay, fine!

(I can't believe I'm doing this.)

I cross the aisle!

I move right along the seats. This is a very long way. I'm getting tired! Also it's growing increasingly dark, mean, and creepy all the way this far out on the right.

But it's for a good cause. I must persevere for the sake of my Country!

Surely there's another aisle here somewhere.

Seat, seat, seat, seat, seat, seat, seat, seat, seat, seat, seat, seat, seat. AHA!

The aisle! I've found it! And I think I can even see someone to the right, on the other side of the aisle. 

And so, once again,

I extend my hand.

I said

I EXTEND MY HAND!

Hmm, I know I can see people across the aisle.

I think I even recognize them. Is that? It is! It's Joe Biden and Kamala Harris.

Oh well, beggars can't be choosers:

I extend my hand.

I said:

I EXTEND MY HAND!

Oh drat, they're looking the other way.

Over here!

Yoo Hoo Joe!

Yoo Hoo Kamala!

Yoo Hoo!

YOO HOO!

Gifts of the Universe

I am not here today to discuss the advisability of taking everything that happens in the world personally. It's probably a bad idea, and the number of times I have found myself bitterly muttering "It's so unfair!" at the vagaries of life has undoubtedly worn some unpleasant grooves into my soul.

But that personalness also has its moments.

When I am walking along in the natural world and an animal blesses me with its presence, it feels not just like a gift, but it even feels a little like the glorious, resounding approval of the Universe.

Thank you Universe. I'm so glad you like me.

I like you too.






I have always felt some of this in my ambling through the natural world, but it has become even more pronounced now as I go out picture taking with my camera. This Summer when I saw my first Monarch Butterfly it remained tauntingly out of reach. I would follow the resplendent insects through the neighborhoods in pursuit of one elusive photograph, but ever would they fly on and on. So one day, when a monarch finally landed on some exquisite flower, my heart was as like to burst. Confetti flung from it. I took pictures and felt Royally endowed, complimented, and redeemed.

I soon found many Monarchs to photograph with my long distance, zoom lens. But venturing within 15 feet of any of these wonders would send the butterfly fluttering away into the air. I often wondered what it might be like to put on my macro lens attachment and take super close-up shots of a Monarch, but I figured that with my needing to be within a foot of my subject for such a thing to work out it probably wasn't in my future butterfly photography.

That is until today, when out photographing, a butterfly flew up to me, danced several seconds in the air a few inches from my face, and then plopped down to preen on the cool, petaless flower I'd just been photographing at my hip.

Okay.

Thank you.

I guess I've been good.

So have you.












After I finished taking ridiculously close pictures of a butterfly's wing, and some bees while I was at it, and a couple of flowers for good measure, I headed off towards home. As I walked I mused on all these things I've been telling you. 

And then all of the sudden there were turkeys all around me.

I am grateful.

And so, clearly, is the Universe.







Notes: