Librarian in Black Blog – Sarah Houghton

I remember when I was in my early 20s how old, experienced, smart, and amazing I felt.  I could take on the world.  I knew my stuff and was going to show everybody.

Recently I had occasion to meet a 21 year old who seemed, to me, like he was still in grade school.  He’s a smart guy with a world of experiences I’ve never had, but oh…my…gosh.  He seemed so, so young to my mid-30s mind.  Just looking at him I felt like I was looking at a kid I would babysit, not hang with.  And when he said he was born in 1990 I just about spit out my drink.  Sweet baby Jesus, I was in high school in 1990.  And I’m sure many of you were already through grad school or working in 1990.  Scary stuff, the passage of time.

Here’s the good thing that came out of that experience.  I now kind of (just kind of though) understand why all of my colleagues treated me like a child when I got my first librarian job at 24.  I must have looked to them like this person looked to me–too young to work, too young to be good at what I did.  It doesn’t excuse the abhorrent behavior I was subjected to on many occasions (the whole “Why don’t you leave and let the grown-ups talk, Sarah” comment at my first librarian job comes to mind), but it does make a little bit more sense to me now.

Now…twenty-somethings are smart.  I would argue they might actually be smarter than we are, because they’re so much closer to all of that wonderful intensive intellectual exploration we call school.  Most of us have let the learning slip out of our heads and haven’t put a whole lot back in.  We’ve gotten lazy, and probably less smart in the traditional sense.  We have built-up knowledge and experience, which is also profoundly helpful, but I would give credit where credit is due to the super smarts of our young friends.  We need to look past the baby fat on their still smooth faces and actually listen to them.

But we still do look at our young counterparts differently…and for the first time I understand why that happened to me.  It’s a gut instinct, an unconscious reaction to another being so much younger than you that you feel protective instead of on equal footing.  I don’t accept it in myself, and I hereby pledge that I won’t do it ever again to anyone else.  But I understand it now.  And that’s the learning I take with me today in my old codgerly brain.

And I swear, if anyone leaves some “but you’re only 34, you’re still a baby yourself” comments I will throttle you.  Seriously…I’m a librarian.  I can find out where you live.

If you follow me on the social networks, you might have seen that I decided to dub this past weekend “Crazy, Selfish, Indulgent Weekend.”  I chronicled my activities this weekend on Twitter, Facebook, and Google+.  I got a lot of questions in all these media about the origin of the weekend, why I was choosing to be public about what I was doing, etc.  I even got an email from a journalist asking me if I was trying to start a meme.

I wasn’t, but that being said, I think everyone needs a “Crazy, Selfish, Indulgent Weekend” every now and again.  So here’s the skinny: I was feeling spent.  I have been giving a lot of myself to others lately, sacrificing a great deal to make others happy, putting myself in a position where I know I’m going to not be happy.  And one can only do that for so long…  I think many of us in public service tend to be like this — give, give, give…until it damages us.

To rectify that, on Friday night I spontaneously planned my weekend to include as many of my favorite things as possible.  There were 13 parts to my two days of awesomeness (and no, I didn’t plan for 13 to be all goth-y and stuff; it just happened).  I decided to be public about it for a number of reasons, chief of which was to encourage others to be selfish too…even if only for a little while.

Here is a chronicle of my self-indulgence, copied from my Google+ posts. Judge me if you will, but you know what?  It was probably the best weekend I’ve ever had in my life.  Feel free to copy and remix!

#SelfishWeekend Part 1: This is what a blissed out post-massage-with-hot-guy Sarah looks like. That’s right…I picked the hot guy on purpose. It is #SelfishWeekend, after all.

#SelfishWeekend Part 2: Walking straight past a library branch & not going in to look around.

#SelfishWeekend Part 3: Favorite meal #1 (@ Cha-Ya) – fresh handmade udon noodles w/ vegetable tempura & genmai cha tea.

#SelfishWeekend Part 4: Walking thru the Castro looking at all the beautiful gay boys.

#SelfishWeekend Part 5: Favorite meal #2 (Lilah Belle’s) – organic roasted veggies & hummus (best I’ve ever had).

#SelfishWeekend Part 6: Favorite meal #3 (Herbivore) – soy chicken shawarma.

#SelfishWeekend Part 7: kitten loooooooove

#SelfishWeekend Part 8: Dancing at the Cat Club in SF. Getting my 80s groove on.

#SelfishWeekend Part 9: Snuggling in a warm blanket w/ my kitties, eating a vegan hot fudge brownie sundae for brunch, & watching Mad Men.

#SelfishWeekend Part 10: Driving Highway 1 along the West Marin coast, listening to Bon Iver.

#SelfishWeekend Part 11: Hiking in the redwoods of Mt. Tamalpais.

#SelfishWeekend Part 12: Wading in the icy tidepools of Muir Beach.

#SelfishWeekend Part 13: Attending the Marin Shakespeare Company’s steampunk production of The Tempest.

So yes…that’s what I did.  And I’d do it again.  I might, perhaps, do all the hiking and other physical activity first, before staying out until 3am dancing  I think the decadent food day would have made more sense post-drinking-dancing night.  Seriously, though…I think we could all use some more self-love and inward focus.  Nurture yourself so you can nurture others.  Take some time for yourself.  You’ve earned it.

This is the third post in my new Sarah’s Gadget Showcase series. #1 (Audio Gadgets) and #2 (Cooking & Food Gadgets) are also available.

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I started reading at the age of three and haven’t stopped since.  I find power in words, solace in them, pain, despair, joy, inspiration, but most importantly, I find life in words.

I am, believe it or not, traditionally a bookish sort.  I started library school wanting to be a rare books librarian, actually, which is kind of funny when you think about what I do now (high tech and futurist trends are pretty much the polar opposite of old, decaying, dusty books).  Of course, my focus in rare books librarianship was on digitization of the materials for open and free dissemination on this relatively new thing they had back then called “the internet.”  So I guess even then the techie bug had bitten me.  But it was, and is, all about the information not the technology that carries it.

There is a weight to a physical book, and I don’t mean a physical heft.  Books have a meaning, a significance in our culture.  They hold untold promises and infinite possibilities. Books are objects of art.  Carrying or owning books implies that you’re intelligent.  Books = good things.

And for all of the years that I’ve been talking about digital libraries, using technology to improve yourself and your community, and even about eBooks specifically…I privately hated eBooks.  I hated the technology that locked them down, I hated how they worked (or rather didn’t), I hated the thought of reading on a screen, just…hated…them.  I clung to my printed books.  I did not advertise this little love-hate relationship with the eBook; only a few people close to me ever knew.

And then (as is wont to happen) the technology got better and I had to eat my own words.  The consumer-level experience of finding and obtaining an eBook got better (sadly, the library eBook experience is still pretty crap).  E Ink was invented and revolutionized the eReading experience entirely. E Ink is the screen technology that makes the Kindle and other devices work–ultra low power consumption, high resolution, and not back-lit. I don’t know about you, but after reading a lit computer screen all day, I honestly do not think my eyes can stand staring at another one for pleasure.

There is a lot that is still jacked up about the digital reading experience. Don’t get me started on digital rights management or we’ll be here all day and you’ll leave with bleeding ears.  But there are some things that work just fine, at least for me.  Most of these aren’t hardware gadgets per se, but apps/software/services.  So how do I read digitally? Let me count the ways…

The Kindle (& its bouquet of assorted hacks)

Yes, I own a Kindle. And I love it. Hate me later library purists; listen to me now.  The E Ink display is fabulous. The reading interface is good, annotating works, sharing passages is nice, battery life is remarkable…it’s all good.  And you can hack it.  Read on.

To me, the Kindle is like a seductive box of dark chocolates: a tasty, wonderful, yet guilty pleasure that I know I shouldn’t indulge in but want so badly.  I am confident there is something amazing in there to be had; I just have to find a gentle and creative way around existing obstacles (in the case of chocolates, my guilt at eating an entire box in one sitting).  And just as with those very few guilty pleasures that I have desired and couldn’t have right away, I’ve been pretty persistent in trying to get what I want with the Kindle.  I am patient and I try to figure out a way to make things work for me even if at first blush it doesn’t look promising.  My instincts are generally good and I usually end up being right and getting what I want.  Just ask my Kindle.

As you may know, the Kindle is a closed ecosystem and you only “license” books from Amazon–you don’t own them as you would with a printed book (same w/ other eBook vendors too).  Rejecting these principles as complete and utter bullshit, I hacked my Kindle.  I absolutely hate that the Kindle is a locked down system, a completely isolated bubble of content and delivery mechanism (just like the iPad and iPhone ecosystems, which I shun on principle b/c I can’t hack them…yet).  Locking down information goes against everything I stand for as a librarian.  Let me be clear: I do not do anything illegal on my Kindle, other than the hacking itself (which is a grey area, imho, even if you adhere to the DMCA to the letter).  I’m not stealing books or giving away books.  I hacked my Kindle so I could do with my device what I want with the books I paid to “license,” when I want, and in what format I want.  And that is the right of every reader, dammit.

“Hack the Kindle?” you ask.  ”Do tell!”  All righty then.  Without getting myself into any more legal difficulties, here are some fabulous resources to get you started on hacking your Kindle into the dirt.  Share these with your co-workers, family members, and (if you’re braver than I am) with your library users.

• Jailbreaking your Kindle (step 1 before you can do a lot of this other stuff)
• Mario1Up posted this great comprehensive list of various Kindle hacks (w/ links to how-to articles) on the mobileread forum site.  These are small things mostly — changing fonts, screensavers, margins, etc.
• Removing DRM from eBooks in a variety of formats (that’s right–I said removing DRM)
• Video tutorial on removing DRM from Mobipocket Kindle eBooks
• KIF – put a text adventure game on your Kindle

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Google Reader

I do a lot of my reading online still–usually on my laptop at home, or my desktop at work.  I’m generally reading blogs, newspapers, magazines, etc. that I find through Google Reader, an RSS aggregator that has stood the test of time and continues to work.  I love the folder system, the interface, the speed, and the app for Android is great.

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Book Discovery

Scout’s honor, I actually do use NoveList to find new books if I’m looking for something in a particular genre.  NoveList is an online resource that many public libraries subscribe to, and I’m glad mine does.  It is a-w-e-s-o-m-e.  From the first time I tried NoveList years ago, it has always made me happy and gives me good recommendations.  Tell it what authors you like, or a book you like, or just keywords you want to read about.  Boom!  Book recommendations.  And I love using it with family members, non-library-world friends, or library users and showing them how to browse around.   You can get lost in there for hours following thread after thread and finding more and more books to put on your “to read” list.  The K-8 version is great for kids too.  I actually found a long-lost-childhood-favorite-book using NoveList after every other method had failed–describing the book to long-time children’s librarians, searching by keywords on search engines and other book sites, no dice.  Love it.
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What do you use?