I've been with Wilhemlsplatz one month today. Let's do one of those, whatchacallems, those... er... thingies they do at the end of the year. You know what I mean... retrospective, that's the word. Let's do a one-month retrospective.

Today a teen came up to the desk and asked for help on his senior research project. He's studying whether street car racing should be legal or not. And it was the damnedest thing-- I was able to help him. I was amazed. He was amazed. We were both amazed that I managed to find him some books and some database articles on drag racing.

After I walked him over to the call number he needed, I headed back to the desk with a big ol' sloppy grin on my face. I couldn't help it. I was so happy that I made this kid happy. This, ver batim, was my thought: "Gosh, I have the best job in the world!"

That is not a typical thought for me. I avoid optimism with religious intensity. It is entirely out of character for me to use exclamation points, and prior to today, I had not realized that "gosh" is in my vocabulary. It is impossible to maintain an image of wry disaffection with pollutants like that creeping into one's speech. Thank God I didn't say it aloud. What would people think?

So that's the good news. I really, really love my job. I already have a passle of patrons who like me, who stop by to chat and keep me apprised on their reading, their research projects, their step-children's iTunes collection. Every day I get the opportunity to help people, and... well... gosh, it feels good.

I also get the opportunity to look smart. The other day I guy came in asking where he could find books by Robert Heinlein. Said he liked Starship Troopers and wanted more by the same author.

"Have you read Stranger in a Strange Land?" I asked him, not missing a beat. The guy hadn't. He really grooved on my improptu booktalk and he just about thought I walked on water when I showed him our Heinlein collection.

Really now-- that was a softball question. It took no special background knowledge or mental dexterity for me to help this guy out. But he didn't know that, and he was just thrilled to get a friendly response. He walked away happy, with a stack of books in his arms, and I looked like a rockstar.

I have a job where I routinely look smart and where I get the bubbly feeling from helping part on a daily basis. Cool.

But I'll be honest, I'm feeling lots of stress. Not from the job-- it doesn't hold a candle to the anxiety I had in Backwater-- but because, as Marian reassures me, two of the biggest stresses in life are moving and getting a new job.

I'm working very, very hard to understand the personal dynamics and social norms within my department and within the library. That in itself is a fulltime job. Though I pride myself on my intuition and my ability to understand people, I'm no great shakes at reading social situations.

Brief sob story:

When I was in second grade, we moved from Mississippi to North Carolina. (Thank. God.) Several months after the move I sent out invitations to all the girls in my class. I wanted them to come to my first-ever birthday party.

...You guessed it. No one came.

Almost two decades have passed, but I'm still that same kid, albeit with boobs and glasses and a college degree or two. As was true then, I have trouble making friends and doing, you know, social stuff.

Am I happy I took this job? Absolutely. I have the best job ever at the best library ever.

Am I a nervous wreck? Yeah, that too. I just about cried when I went to the local coffee shop today. I forced myself to go: not only did I want to celebrate my one-month anniversary, I wanted to take precautions against hiding in my apartment all the time. Did enough of that in Franklin, thanks. And I do so like coffee. More than life itself, if you must know.

So I put on my fuzzy jacket and pretended I looked like Helena Bonham Carter and I walked over to the trendy/hip coffee place.

But I was by myself! And it was noisy! And I didn't know what to do!

Where was I supposed to order? Where was I supposed to pick up my order? Where was I supposed to sit? Was I supposed to sit before I got my order, or was I supposed to loiter? Where was I supposed to loiter, if that's what I was supposed to do?

After waffling and feeling nervous I decided to sit at an innocuous looking table, and I hit my head on the overhead light. That's when I almost-- almost-- started crying. I managed not to. Would Helena Bonham Carter cry? Would Helena Bonham Carter get all nervous because she was in a new coffee shop?

...have to say, getting coffee wasn't nearly the relaxing Bohemian experience I had anticipated. But at least I tried. Maybe next time I'll look suave, or at least not completely inept.

To recap this one-month analysis:

Job satisfaction: 100 gazillion percent

Social comfort: er... needs work.

Librarians like to go to conferences. On the surface, this is because we enjoy learning new things, meeting with vendors, and networking with colleagues. In truth, we suffer through the learning, meeting, and networking only because we know there will be a party at the end of the day. The post-conference party is the reason-- the only reason-- we have conferences. Ask any librarian.

I got to the conference early-- early, mind you, on a day when I wasn't supposed to start work till 1-- to hobnob with the vendors. This is a very important part of conference attendance for any librarian. The reason it is so important is because each vendor has free candy, pens, books, squeezy rubber stress balls, novelty bobblehead toys, bookmarks, and/or dildos to give away. (Have not actually seen a Free Dildo display. Vendors take note.)

The most remarkable vendor interaction came when I sidled up to the Behemouth Industry Juggernaut (BIJ) booth. "Hi," I said. "I'm Jessica Kennedy-Rockefeller with Wilhelmsplatz."

Both exhibitors stopped in mid-sentence, gave the cold shoulder to the people they'd been chatting up, and turned to me in awe. The one fellow dropped to his knees, promised to divorce his wife, and proposed marriage. The other lady presented me with a 14-carat diamond-encrusted tiara. The Juilliard String Quartet appeared from the sidelines and began playing my favorite chamber music. An Angel of the Lord apparated in a very tasteful halo of fire. Birds sang. Bunny rabbits hopped. World peace ensued.

I swear, my own mother has never greeted me with as much enthusiasm as the BIJ folks did. I mean I'm used to warm receptions and fawning admirers, being Jessica Kennedy-Rockefeller and all, but good day. These people really, really like me.

Attended a very cool session on Library 2.0. Lots of cool ideas on blogs, social networking sites, wikis, website syndication-- cheap or free trendy technologies that libraries can use to woo patrons/users/customers.

(Sorry, but I can't get into "user." I realize that "patron" makes us sound like Medicis, and "customer" makes us sound like Wal-Mart, but user? "I'm sorry, ma'am, Alyosha can't come to the phone. He's helping a user." ... "Yes ma'am, I realize I'm a pale imitation of Alyosha, but could you possibly compromise your integrity and permit me to assist you?" ... "Yes ma'am. Thank you ma'am. It's an honor to place a hold on this James Patterson book for you. You're number 438 on the hold list. Yes ma'am. Go to hell, ma'am.")

Attended a thoroughly useless session on the application of websites as a marketing tool. Had such insightful advice as "it should look good!" and "patrons can use your website to check the catalog!" Waste of time. Want my forty-five minutes back.

Then scurried off to the liberry to work the desk for a few hours. Got to know Jim Casy better. Through stories, got to know more about Jim Casy's older sister, Jim Casy's other older sister, Jim Casy's younger sister, Jim Casy's mom, and Jim Casy's dad. Quiz to follow.

Then scurried back to the conference to claim my free margarita. Then to claim the free margarita of a friend from liberry school I'd run into. Then to claim the free margarita of a former coworker I'd also run into.

Hung out with several of my new coworkers. Debated politics with spouse of one of said coworkers. Deflected lewd comments from some aging has-been frats. Comported self with perfect grace, articulation, and clarity, or leastaways that's how I remember it.

Glad I got the chance to hobnob with a few of the folks outside my immediate circle of coworkers. There are a great many departments at the library. In fact, this library has more departments than my former library had warm bodies working for it, subs and volunteers withstanding. (This new library has to turn away volunteers, there are so many. It's obscene.) I'm starting to get to know some of the personalities that populate the Other parts of the liberry, and what a motley group it is.

Let me put it this way: my new purple hair fit right in. This is very, very encouraging.

Thanks to Marian the Librarian, a Real Live Book Editor has contacted me to see if I'd like to write a book. Me! Write a book! That's so COOL!

Now it happens that this book would be part of a series of library texts about different nonfiction genres. And it also happens that I don't like to read nonfiction. So let's keep that tidbit to ourselves, shall we?

This is my ticket to celebrity. Annotated bibliographies are destined to become bestsellers. I can already hear the paparazzi pounding at my door.

(Oh... on second thought, that's my neighbour snoring. These apartment walls are frightfully thin... Fortunately, my neighbor is married. Everyone knows that married people don't have sex. I haven't had to listen to anything embarassing.)

I'm going to write the book proposal this weekend. (I had said I would write it last weekend, but... eh...) I shall propose that I write a book on Women's Nonfiction. This is not, to my knowledge, an actual genre, but I am not going to let niggling little details keep me from the fame I so clearly deserve.

I shall further propose that my book about women's nonfiction be called Just the Ma'am Facts: A Guide to Blah Blah di Blah Blah.

(In my experience, no one ever reads beyond the mandatory semicolon, so I can fill it with whatever I like. Subtitle options abound!

• Just the Ma'am Facts: Why Jessica Kennedy-Rockefeller Is The Sexiest Librarian Ever
• Just the Ma'am Facts: The Ordinary Person's Guide to Requesting Audience with Jessica Kennedy-Rockefeller
• Just the Ma'am Facts: Collected Fan Letters to Jessica Kennedy-Rockefeller)

So, um, if anyone knows of any, um, Women's Nonfiction books, feel free to let me know about them. And let me know about any subgenres of Women's Nonfiction. And, while we're at it-- do drop me a line if you find evidence that Women's Nonfiction is, in fact, a genre.

The subject line is a teaser, naturally. What sort of immorality are we talking about? Heroin-shooting librarians? Gluttonous librarians? Menage a librarian?

To get to the answer, you'll have to first read through a paragraph of whining. (I suppose the very clever among you will realize that you can skip to the next block of text after a line break, but none of my readers except Marian are very clever.) (That was just a joke, other readers.) So here's my whiny bit: OH SWEET LORD BUT I AM TERRIBLE AT SOCIAL INTERACTION. It's like middle school all over again. I have this desperate need to fit in and to get to know people and to have them like me, and I don't have the first clue how to go about doing it. I have decided to stop going to work because the social anxiety is just unbearable. I am going to stay home and do crossword puzzles. But don't worry, I've made an arrangement to have Jessica Kennedy-Rockefeller fill in for me.

Now then. Immoral librarians. Here's the question: To what extent are librarians obligated to read books they don't like?

(I suppose it's a stretch to couch this in terms of morality, but I like speaking about moral absolutes. It's nice having God on my side.)

I posit that every public librarian needs to read The Da Vinci Code and Harry Potter and the [pick one]. These are unique cultural phenomena. You simply have to read them to be in tune with your patrons.

Beyond Dan Brown and J.K. Rowling, though-- what's the obligation? What books do we need to read to best serve our patrons? Do we even need to read them at all? Are book reviews acceptable substitutes?

On the far side of the debate you have the laissez-faire librarians, whose argument goes something like this: "I'm not in high school anymore. Leave me the fuck alone." On the other side of the debate you have... me. I think a good librarian needs to read widely in all the main genres (fiction AND nonfiction) and in emerging genres such as Urban Fiction and Street Lit. Reading should include a sampling of seminal genre works, current buzz-worthy titles, and bestsellers.

It's a nice idea, but there are two big dilemmas: you might not like a particular genre, and even the most diligent of us don't have enough time to keep up with everything. Things get especially ugly when everything you read is for duty and nothing is for personal pleasure.

Even I don't have enough time to read as widely as I should, and I have remarkably few distractions: I don't watch teevee, I don't have kids, I don't trouble my pretty little head with housework.

So if Little Miss Boring here doesn't have time to complete a comprehensive study of the genres, there's no way that normal people can be expected to.

And yet...

And yet. I think we ought to try. (Librarians, I mean. All you other folks? You're not in high school anymore.) To be truly good librarians, we ought to read outside our comfort zones, and we ought to be fluent in all the major genres. You can fake it okay by reading reviews, but for a visceral understanding of what your patrons want, you need to read what they read. Amen.

I am going to go do a crossword puzzle. Leave me the fuck alone.