-From Pale Fire
Fitting for me to wrap things up with a quote from my favorite author, the one whose writing inspired a love for the printed word so deep that I became a librarian, and this blog was born.
I now consider this blog to be a finished product. There won't be any more posts. It was about the struggles of trying to become a librarian, and it lasted far longer than I thought or hoped it would. But that part of my life is behind me now. That is, unless I get laid off in a few months and need to begin my search anew, but we'll just imagine it's not likely. I feel that this is a good way to bookend the blog; my second and penultimate posts are titled "Give Up" and "I gave up," respectively.
Now I suppose to sum up. I finally made it, I'm a librarian. It happened just 3 months shy of my decade anniversary of receiving my MLIS.
To review, what was the cost of this MLIS?
--10s of thousands of dollars of debt, between undergrad and grad school. I think it began in the low 40,000s, and is currently at 11,500.
--Losing out on a decade of my life. A decade I was unable to live independently, meaning a decade I was unable to do various things in my personal life that were important. Things that I have a greatly diminished ability to do now that I'm 35, as those activities were much more suited for people in their 20s.
--Had to move to literally the other side of the country, nearly 1,000 miles away from everyone I know, to a state where like-minded people are harder to come by.
--Earning a salary that's a bit on the entry-level side. My dad made significantly more just being a mailman.
I don't mean to sound unhappy, so I'll also list the positives:
--I like every single person I work with.
--I'm doing a job that feels meaningful. I get to do something that makes a positive difference in the world, rather than toil away just to make a rich asshole richer.
Those two things matter, and they matter a lot. I'm not at all unhappy in life right now. But you can find those things in jobs other than librarian.
In the end was it worth it? Absolutely not. I fucked up my life for library science. I lost the best years of my life waiting for something to come together for me.
Would I recommend an MLIS to anyone? Absolutely not.
Would I, in fact, actively discourage people from pursuing an MLIS? A little. I recognize that no one can predict the future. When I was in grad school they were predicting a huge boom for library jobs soon after I was scheduled to get my degree, and look how that worked out. But still, I think a huge fall is much more likely in this field than a huge boom, and I would likely at the very least give the same advice I would have close to the start of this blog. You had better be passionate enough that you're willing to make sacrifices and spend a good long time living the starving artist life. If you're not, I highly recommend fucking right off, for your own sake.
Would I do things over differently if I had the chance to turn back time? Yes, I would. I would absolutely choose a different career.
But am I happy now? Yeah. I mean, I guess ask me again when I'm 50 and still never got what I really wanted out of life because I started too late, but right now I'm happy. I've made a life for myself, albeit very late, and I'm doing something worthwhile with good people.
For posterity, here is the map I had been working on of my application attempts in its final version. I failed to achieve my goal of being rejected by every state in the union, but I came very close. Maybe someday...
On a final note, I posted on a librarian forum about me getting the job after nearly a decade. I was shocked to see people telling me that yeah, that sounds about right. I know the field is in poor shape, but I thought my case was exceptionally bad. Sadly, I was wrong. A few people told me that it's exactly normal, and absolutely no one tried to tell me I was just especially unlucky, and most people fare better. Not one. I submit that, while it's obviously possible to do better, it's also not incredibly unusual for things to go just about this badly.
On another final note: I reread over my old posts. There are some very, very dark turns in here. I was depressed through some of this, and when I was, it showed. I can't even remember what it feels like to be so miserable, and thankfully I haven't felt that way in some time. When I look back on it, it's actually scary to see it. It's a great relief to know I made it through all of that.
Happy trails to all, thanks everyone who read. Most people finish novels faster than I finished this blog, but at least it finally happened. Goodbye and good night.
