The Library Manager speaks...

According to my calendar, the Morrisville Public Library in Morrisville NY has been closed for 24 days.  This has been very hard for me to fathom.  We close for a week between Christmas and New Year's and that seems to be a long time, this seems like an eternity.

I go over to the library a few times a week and check on the building.  It's lacking life right now.  The heat has been turned back, the lights are off, the posters on our bulletin board I had the staff remove the last day we were open.  Our dry erase board upon entering is void of writing, our St. Patrick's Day bulletin board near the children's books is still hung.  The place smells musty and feels lifeless.  Our building is wanting people inside it's walls.

I am feeling the same.  Today, I called a patron who had finished a book we both wanted to read and discuss before we closed.  I had most of it to read still.  She told me that last day we were open that now we would never get a chance to discuss the book.  It took me forever as adjusting to working from home, trying to find groceries for my family of 5 (with 4 grown adults), homeschool and the guilt of not having a hot meal on the table when my husband came home now that I was home all day, took most of my time.  By the time my youngest was in bed, I would read a chapter and fall asleep.  I finished the last three chapters last night.  Today, I called this wonderful woman and for 35 minutes we discussed the book, how her and her husband were doing to completing the census, trying to navigate the grocery stores and now the new odd and even days to go out.  This conversation made my day.  It felt like I was there in my office talking to a patron and things were normal.  In all reality, I was home, in my bedroom (as that was the only free room at the moment), talking on my cell phone in my hang out at home clothes.  But I could imagine life was back to normal.  I am going to find another patron to call tomorrow.

Normal, what is back to normal anyway?  Governor Cuomo says we will never be back to normal but instead have a new normal.  Will we ever be able to hug someone again or shake hands?  Can I stop carrying hand sanitizer and gloves in my car?  When can I go back to work where distractions are from my patrons and not the dog, a kid or the doorbell?  I know when the new normal takes place, I will have a new excitement to get back to that building, be exuberant when a patron wants to talk and just be glad that life has returned to a new normal outside of this stay home and don't breathe on anyone domain we live in right now.

Am I happy?  Hey, how lucky am I that I have a job and can work at home?  This is something we all dream of right?  I am so damned lucky to have a job when most don't.  I am not sure about the work at home.  I miss the quiet times in the library for working, the patron chats, the smell of new books, the helping people....being social.  As for happy....I really don't know.  There are days where I want to cry because I don't think I can take much more of the changes that are coming.  I will admit, I wish I could get the virus, let God choose what will happen to me and just be done with this waiting game.  I have the most amazing dreams when I do sleep of times before this 6ft rule and the don't leave home mandates.  I wake and sometimes think it was all just a joke.  I think it's completely normal to have good days and bad....so I am "normal".  There is that normal word again.....

I have rambled enough.  None of it makes sense probably but I wanted you all to know, that it's okay.  We are okay to not be perfect right now, it's okay to be sad, it's okay to not be "normal".  I am just like the rest of you, trying to hold it all together....but feeling like that proverbial bug that hits the windshield.  We will all get through this and then can go back to trying to staple jello to the wall.....

Stay safe all, be well, stay home and if any of you need to chat, leave a message for me at the Library (315-684-9130) as I am not keen about posting my cell number on the Internet, or email me at:  mrounds@midyork.org.  I miss all of you more than any of you will ever know!  ~Michelle Rounds