You never really know do you?
Its almost comical, but every time I think I know something, I'm reminded that I have no clue. I'm 27 now, and I still don't even know about all of the programs at my own university. I know that sounds crazy, but it's true.
My evolution as a participant in academia (for lack of a better term) has been a continual growth along a very weird path. In fact, I often think of it in terms of knowing the path and not being able to follow it. I get this visual image of myself running through the bushes at full speed, ripping flesh off and continually tripping, when the path is just a few feet to my left the whole time.
I guess having recognized that is a start, but it feels kind of like I finally graduated kindergarten at 27. Think I'll make it to high school by 90?
I recently met a very interesting person, who turned out to be a librarian at UNCW. Now, I don't know what things are like where you come from, but here, librarians are a lot more interesting. When I was growing up the librarian was the mean old lady that always bugged you about checking out books on vampires and told you to read some Tom Sawyer. Now, I admit that I probably would be a great deal more intelligent if I had taken her advice, but vampires are cool. Of course, that knowledge has never really proved useful, and I outgrew the vampire facination by middle school, so maybe she was right. Regardless, the point is that I think most people back in my home town view librarians as public servants that are working blue collar jobs. I actually believed that, but a slow metamorphosis of that image has occurred in my time at UNCW.
It began when I was doing some research and asked about a reference I was unsure of. Keep in mind that I'm a VERY solitary person (with research anyway), and asking for help rarely occurs in academic work. In fact, this whole story of my first question for help at the library took place the third year I was at school! So I tell the woman my quagmire, and wait for some standard answer that doesn't help and reminds me why I never ask. Instead, I get a question, "What are you really trying to find out?" Now I'm thinking, oh great, now she's going to tell me how to really do research. I appease her and answer that I'm trying to find some numbers so I can compare statistics of such and such...she replies, "Oh, there is a set of books that already has the statistical analysis on that done." !!! Needless to say, I lost about half of my negative and arrogant attitude that day. And I learned that librarians are a great deal more than just blue collar workers.
So what the hell am I talking about...this person I met, who is a librarian, is completely amazing, and therefore a complete suprise. I checked out her webpage to learn more about her, and found that she has worked on all these amazing projects with Native American's and the Women's Resource Center and the community book club for Wilmington and on and on....
So now I must restate the learning:
(1) Librarians are actually keepers of information, that probably know better than I do, how to find something out.
(2) Arrogance and minimal intelligence are bad combinations.
(3) I have more to learn than years to learn it, I better get started.
Peace
My evolution as a participant in academia (for lack of a better term) has been a continual growth along a very weird path. In fact, I often think of it in terms of knowing the path and not being able to follow it. I get this visual image of myself running through the bushes at full speed, ripping flesh off and continually tripping, when the path is just a few feet to my left the whole time.
I guess having recognized that is a start, but it feels kind of like I finally graduated kindergarten at 27. Think I'll make it to high school by 90?
I recently met a very interesting person, who turned out to be a librarian at UNCW. Now, I don't know what things are like where you come from, but here, librarians are a lot more interesting. When I was growing up the librarian was the mean old lady that always bugged you about checking out books on vampires and told you to read some Tom Sawyer. Now, I admit that I probably would be a great deal more intelligent if I had taken her advice, but vampires are cool. Of course, that knowledge has never really proved useful, and I outgrew the vampire facination by middle school, so maybe she was right. Regardless, the point is that I think most people back in my home town view librarians as public servants that are working blue collar jobs. I actually believed that, but a slow metamorphosis of that image has occurred in my time at UNCW.
It began when I was doing some research and asked about a reference I was unsure of. Keep in mind that I'm a VERY solitary person (with research anyway), and asking for help rarely occurs in academic work. In fact, this whole story of my first question for help at the library took place the third year I was at school! So I tell the woman my quagmire, and wait for some standard answer that doesn't help and reminds me why I never ask. Instead, I get a question, "What are you really trying to find out?" Now I'm thinking, oh great, now she's going to tell me how to really do research. I appease her and answer that I'm trying to find some numbers so I can compare statistics of such and such...she replies, "Oh, there is a set of books that already has the statistical analysis on that done." !!! Needless to say, I lost about half of my negative and arrogant attitude that day. And I learned that librarians are a great deal more than just blue collar workers.
So what the hell am I talking about...this person I met, who is a librarian, is completely amazing, and therefore a complete suprise. I checked out her webpage to learn more about her, and found that she has worked on all these amazing projects with Native American's and the Women's Resource Center and the community book club for Wilmington and on and on....
So now I must restate the learning:
(1) Librarians are actually keepers of information, that probably know better than I do, how to find something out.
(2) Arrogance and minimal intelligence are bad combinations.
(3) I have more to learn than years to learn it, I better get started.
Peace
posted by Sean at
8:34 PM
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