Thoughts about our local library.

The thing is that I've had a few problems with the staff at our local library before. I've been going to the library since Ivana was probably 6 months old. First it was a place to hang out on a rainy day and keep myself sane by talking to people and getting a few books for myself. Then slowly I started reading books for Ivana there. In the beginning the reading sessions didn't last for too long, but overtime she'd get interested in the pictures and stories and take one book after another with the excitement of an explorer.

So the rules posted on the front doors of our library have been bugging me for quite some time! I understand "no food or drink" policy, but how do you explain a 1 year old that she can't drink right that moment, that we have to stop reading the book and go outside for her to take a sip? Once I had to change her diaper in the front lobby in the secluded nook (the bathrooms are upstairs and you need to ask for the key), and it was not a pooped diaper, just soggy. I packed it into the plastic bag and tied the not tightly, as I always did at home or anywhere we went. So there was a security guard by the entrance door and he asked me to take the diaper out from the garbage bin. What? I thought he was kidding me! I told him to take a close look at what had been in the bin, all the leftovers of hotdogs, burgers decomposing in the heat of the mid summer. You can already imagine the odor, that diaper was probably the most sterile thing there ever! We started to argue and he threatened to complain to the chief librarian and make sure I was no longer allowed into the building. What?

Then there was a bicycle incident. This time there was no sign that bicycles were not allowed into the library, as with the "no diapers in the garbage" sign. Well, it was a toddler's bicycle that I was afraid to leave outside, and we brought it with us upstairs and left standing in the corner by the elevator. There was the whole commotion and investigation whom this bicycle belonged to, and after the same guard found out it was ours, he just took it downstairs and left it on the street. We had to leave the library to make sure we still have that bicycle.

I didn't give up going to the library anyway. I refused to be intimidated and stood up for myself every time there was a problem. And lately I've been coming there with pretty long lists. Every time I hear about a book on homeschooling I'd write it down and then request it at the library. I started with John Gatto, John Holt ( I had all 7 books written by him on my list!), Charlotte Mason, Ruth Beechick, Christopher Klicka, etc, etc, etc. Every time it would take forever for them to try to locate the book for me, searching in the entire state library loan program. I was able to get only a few books (to be precise 3), and whatever they did not have I bought on Amazon.

That day when I had a list with 7 of John Holt's books, the librarian asked me if I was doing a PhD. in Homeschooling! Was she serious, was she sarcastic or just curious, I could not really tell, but I liked that idea a lot and happily said: "YES! As a matter of fact, that's exactly what I'm doing!"

Today I have asked to try to help me to locate books by Ruth Beechick, "The three R's". And a young librarian, probably freshly graduated from college, searched for the books for me, and once again said that the New Jersey library system did not seem to have these books. There were similar books by different author, but it sounded that they were instruction manuals for the teachers in the classrooms, which obviously I did not need. So he volunteered to check them on Amazon to make sure I had the right author. I knew I did, but he wanted to double check anyway. In a minute or so he confirmed the author I had told him and them looked at me with a strange look and said: "But they are only $12 on Amazon! Why don't you buy them!"
What! I was just shocked to hear that! I didn't want to start explaining myself that I'd purchased so many books already because the library did not have what I wanted. Simply, I sadly agreed that's what I would have to do anyway.

Now this sign makes me angry: "No students in the library during school hours. Per Board of Education". I understand that it has nothing to do with the library making up rules, but come on! Would you rather let a kid be in a library and maybe read a book or flip through the magazines, maybe really learn something and be safe, than to have him wander on the streets getting into trouble?! It just doesn't make sense to me... It doesn't make sense at all!!!