I think this is how Houdini died

My last post was hopeful, so you had to know I was in for a fall.

I mentioned having had two interviews, and one I hadn't been rejected from yet.  Well, now I have.

This is a huge punch to the gut for me, so I'm just going to type this out off the top of my head, no rough draft.  No polishing, I don't want to live with this longer than I had to.  Just a blunt, visceral stream of consciousness write-up.  Be prepared.

This was a job I wanted badly.  Not just the job itself, but the location.  You'll remember, perhaps, that I'm not being picky about where I apply.  So of the millions of cities in the US, what are the odds that I'd be rejected for 5 years straight and then be offered an interview-- and come closer to getting it than I ever have-- in the one exact specific place I wanted to be?  A place where, had I gotten that job, the rest of my life could have fallen into place instantly.  Millions and millions and millions of libraries, and the one place that comes so close to offering me a job in that time is in that exact city.  The odds of that have to be at least 3 to 1.

I don't know what this means.  The odds are too crazy to be coincidence, so how could that have happened for nothing?  But apparently, it did.  It was for nothing, I failed again, and I guess that's a dream I can shove in a hole to die now.

But enough about me, back to the focus of this blog-- what my experience implies for other new or new-ish librarians.  And that is this:

To get to this stage of the interview I had to travel, and I had to do it on my own dime.  The library was 270 miles away from my current home.  I put over 500 miles on my car in 2 days, set out early in the morning with nothing but my GPS and a case of CDs (thank you, Mansun, Pearl Jam, Smashing Pumpkins, Troubled Hubble, Electric Six, and Frank Zappa!), and hope.  I spent about 80 on gas both ways, 80 on an inn, and 20 dollars for dinner out (including two glasses of scotch, in a state where alcohol is not as dirt cheap as in WI).  So, about 180 dollars of my own money got spent just so I could see a rejection email no different from any other.  It could have been a bit cheaper, but I just wanted a place close to the job.  Subtract the difference between the inn and a more sensible motel, and not ordering the drinks at dinner, and I could have done this for 150, perhaps.  Still, that's 150 dollars.

The issue is, how sustainable is this?  Say you're a new librarian looking for your first full time job and you actually do get interview offers.  How much of your own money-- especially on your current non-salary-- can you spend going to interview after interview just to add to your collection of emails stating that while you were a strong candidate, they decided to pursue someone who more closely suits their needs?

The other implication for new librarians is this: sometimes this will hurt.  Badly.  The other rejections I got were easy to sour grapes.  I just made "sour grapes" a verb, get over it.  But this one, this one would have been everything I ever.  It was the perfect millions to one job that I'll never have a chance at again.  And now that dream can go fuck off and die forever.  I wanted this job so bad it literally hurt.  And I mean, before I was rejected.  It hurt how badly I wanted it, and I was not misusing the word "literally" when I said that.  I came so close to it, beating incalculable odds just to do that, but it was for nothing.  I fail.  Game over.  And sometimes, dear new librarian, that may happen.  Not every rejection can be brushed off as "oh well, at least I won't have to move there" or "I figured it was out of my league, but it was worth a shot."  Sometimes you'll take a punch to the gut.

I don't want to get off the floor right now.  Let me just lie here for a while.

Not dead, just buried

I feel I owe an update to the dozens of spambots and the zero real, actual people who read this blog.

There has been news.  Kind of a lot of news, actually.  The problem is, I've been busy.  And when I'm not busy, my depression demands that I do nothing but sit here in my sweatpants playing Skyrim for 12 hours straight.

But enough about my crippling mental disorders, here's the news.  In the past 2 months I have had two interviews for full time jobs.  To put that in context, the last full time job I was interviewed for (not counting This catastrophe, which I don't and neither should you) was about 4.5 years ago.  So I went from nothing year after year after year, to two interviews for full time positions in two months.

I got my MLIS in 2008.  It is now 2013.  That's 5 years and change.  That was how long it took for me to turn a corner where my experience is now enough to get me looked at.  As you may recall, my experience all this time has been adjunct info lit instruction, so maybe it's not as bad if you're the lucky kind of son or daughter of a bitch who can somehow land a part time job that's actually in a library.  I don't know how such a thing as possible, but eh, people get lucky.  Maybe you did fieldwork where there just happened to be an opening.  Good for you.  You son or daughter of a bitch.  Anyway, if you're one of those people then I guess you probably didn't have as long of a wait.  If you're like me and your only job has been teaching info lit as an adjunct (I know I'm not the only one!), the the magic number you're looking for is 5.  Five years and just maybe your resume will start getting looked at (albeit, only for jobs with a heavy instruction component).

And if you didn't hit the jackpot and stumble ass-first into a part time position right out of library school, AND if you didn't make the connections to get a teaching gig at the very least (in which case you must think me the son or daughter of a bitch), then haha, wow, I have no idea what it's going to be for you.

I may be jumping the gun, though.  I'm aware that two interviews doesn't prove a pattern.  It could very well be that getting two interviews was luck, and the fact they were 2 months from each other is coincidence, and now I'll be back to another 5 year dry spell.  Could be, but honestly I don't think so.  It's kind of hard to admit, but I actually have a good feeling about this.

I got rejected from that first job, by the way.  The other one... well, we'll wait and see.

Swimming against the current

When I was just finishing up library school and getting ready to face the nonexistent odds of attracting an employer’s attention with very little experience to my name, a friend in the field let me know about the one positive I could look at, namely my currency.  “You’ll be more current than the person who hires you.”  That was the bright side back in mid 2008, and now it’s an edge I’m rapidly losing.  At this point-- five monkey-fucking years into my search for a full time position-- it’s no longer completely ridiculous to think I may actually be less current than the person who will hire me.  Don’t get me wrong, I am more than happy to trade that dull edge for my five years of experience (even if it’s just as an adjunct instructor), I’m merely reflecting on how ridiculous it is that I may get my first full time job from someone who is an even more recent graduate than I am.

I also need to consider at this point, how current am I really?  I have to admit, aside from the word “festschrift,” I remember roughly jack about cataloging.  I may remember using Dreamweaver in my digital libraries class, but I don’t really remember how at this point.  What I’m saying is I’ve lost a lot of the knowledge from all those years ago.  Not exactly current.

Besides, after five years, is any of it really still “current” anyway?  Perhaps you could call it “more current” than ten years ago, but a closer miss is still a miss.  “Current” today seems to revolve a lot around mobile devices and apps.  There were no courses on using either of these things to a library’s advantage when I was in school.  Nowadays, however, I see a lot of jobs calling for knowledge of mobile devices, and even experience with designing apps.  That sort of thing is far out of my league, and always will be.  You see, I don’t freaking have a mobile device and have never used an app.  And this is a place where I’m going to have to draw the line and be left behind.  I am simply not going to pay for a device and a monthly fee that I really can’t afford for a product that I don’t have a personal need for and do not want, just to be able to say I know my way around mobile devices and apps.  Librarians like to talk about the digital divide, and this is where I’m a victim of it; I’m being left behind because of the tacit expectation that I’m electronically keeping up with the Joneses, and am willing and able to spend all the money it would take to do so.

I’m not a neoluddite.  I know how to use IM, I know how to create profiles on social media, and I’m obviously on a computer right now (with Windows 7).  But holy crap, people have got to be able to draw the line somewhere, and for me it’s paying a monthly bill for something I don’t even want, just to have the latest technology.  But again, this decreases my currency even further in terms value in the job hunt.  How long do I have to land a job somewhere before I'm considered so out of date that my odds of being hired go from one in 999 trillion to a flat zero?

Have I actually become a dinosaur in my field before ever landing a full time (or even half time) job?

On the bright side: death

I’ve found that I’m far too candid when people ask me how I am.  No one really wants to know.  I know this by the way they keep walking without giving me a chance to answer.  I know it by the way I’ll say something completely nonsensical and they’ll respond with “good!”  I’m well aware of the social convention where I’m supposed to say “good” or “fine” (no matter how I actually feel).  And I don’t do that.

No, instead the most awful crap will fall out of my head.  I will tell complete strangers, or people whose faces I know from seeing them around maybe twice a month or so, things like “I constantly fantasize about dying of cancer, and I sincerely want that to happen.”  Today it was: “I think I’ll give it til the end of the year, and if I still don’t have a full time job I’ll just do heroin until I die of AIDS.”

That… that is pretty fucking dark.  And rest assured, I do not think I’m being “funny” when I say these things to people.  I may not literally want to die of AIDS (though the cancer thing?  Completely true, actually…), but the sentiment does reflect my mood and how I feel about life.

For the most part, I consider saying these things to be a kind of revenge.  They asked a question they didn’t want an answer to, so I get back at them by giving them an actual answer.  Just my little way of saying: “there, we both feel awkward now.  Happy?  Let that be a lesson about asking about stuff you don’t want to know about.”

But still, holy crap, it is getting really fucking dark.  Like, really dark, to the point where this isn't ok anymore.  My honest answers are taking a turn for the worse.   The misery of my unemployability has gotten to the point where dying of cancer is my favorite fantasy.  I just imagine how nice it would be for all the weight to be off.  No more stressing about how my clock is tickin’ and I still haven’t found a job.  No more wondering or worrying about what will become of me.  Finally, an answer.  A final answer.  I would just know that nope, I’m not going to get what I wanted out of life, but I could be at peace with that because I’d know that I won’t have to worry about it any longer.  I'll be dead soon, so nothing I wanted is actually going to matter anymore.  I’d fulfill my obligations to work, if possible, then leave that miserable place, and spend my last days enjoying the little things in life while my loved ones—the few there are—all tell me how awesome I was and say their goodbyes.

That’s true, every word of it.  I mean, I’m sure the physical agony of cancer would be hard to take, but aside from that, just emotionally, knowing it’s over and being at peace would be so wonderful.  I can’t stop thinking about that.

To be clear, I’m not saying I’d kill myself.  I wouldn’t.  I’m just saying that a large part of me hopes to have it taken care of for me.

That’s another fun thing to consider if you want to be a librarian: how emotionally strong are you?  What effect will years and years and years of failure have on you?  Think you can take it?  This is probably a career to stay away from if you, unlike me, might actually have it in you to find that easy way out.  

Because sometimes, I can't help but pray for it.  Sadly I know it will not happen, for I am simply far too pretty to die. 

Wash it down the drain

As I think of how unprepared I feel to do most of the jobs I find on the job hunt, and how scary everything seems, and how hard and how much work, I often think I’m trying and failing to do something I have no business doing.  I know that my life has been a never ending cycle of me thinking I don’t have the competence to do something, and then doing it well.  And I know I earned my degree, and I did well in my fieldwork, and I’m doing at least well enough not to get fired with my current position, but none of that makes me feel prepared or capable of doing 99% of the library jobs I see.

As I sat (alone.  In the dark.  If you must know) tonight, dwelling on that very issue, I couldn’t help thinking about how I’ve set myself up for failure by trying to do something I’m just not good enough to do, and then I thought: “All because it was so fucking important for people to think I’m smart.”

I mentioned before why I chose to be a librarian, and all of that was true, but it’s also true that my motivation for a lot of things in life stems from wanting to show that I’m smart (and in my previous explanation, that was indeed my reason for getting into reading before I found that book that really made me into reading).

I know “Librarian” doesn’t say “genius” the way a medical degree or something would, but I’m not smart enough for a medical degree.  But I am (or thought I would be) smart enough to be a librarian.  And hey, librarians are considered smart.

The only problem is, now that I’m trying to get that job I really don’t think I’m smart enough at all.  I mean, I’m smart at a few things.  Reading, of course.  Logic, of the “if X, then Y” variety.  And I was a good student because of that, being able to see patterns easily.  I still remember one example.  Elementary school, some guest speaker was talking to us all, grades 1-6.  I was probably somewhere in grades 1-3, can’t say where for sure.  He had a long rectangular box with doors on both sides, and he put a ball in one side and asked where it was.  Someone pointed to the side he put the ball in.  He tilted the box so the ball rolled to the other side, then opened the door the kid pointed at to reveal it wasn’t there, and asked again where the ball was.  Another kid points to the side the ball rolled to, and he tilted the box the other way… etc.  This went on for several rounds, and I was /dying/ for him to call on me.  I couldn’t believe that no one else had figured it out.  Simple, point to where the ball isn’t and he’ll tilt it and that’s where the ball will be.  Simple pattern recognition, right?  He was calling on all the older kids, and none of them got it.  I’m sure I was one of the few who did.  He even made a comment at some point, along the lines of “you’d think they’d figure it out by now” before giving up completely.

And in the post I linked to above, you see that my kindergarten teacher didn't think it was even possible for someone to read fluently at the age of 5 until I was her student.

So where does all this insecurity come from?  This driving need for people to see me as intelligent?  Easy.  I had another trait as a small child: I liked making people laugh.  So I tried to do that at every chance I got, getting myself a bit of a "class clown" reputation.  I didn't know it at first, but apparently the stereotype is that class clowns are dumb.  That's just the stereotype: the kid seeks attention because he's not good at anything else.  I eventually realized that the other students weren't aware of the smarts I had, they were only aware of the clown persona, and applied all the usual stereotypes to it.  Everyone was treating me like an idiot, and it was the worst feeling in the world.  I never got over that.  to this day nothing gets under my skin quite like someone insulting my intelligence.

Therefore, it was important to me all my life that people see me as smart.  Therefore, reading and higher education.  Therefore, librarian.  When I dig further back into my past than the post linked above, I see it was my insecurity that took me here and drove me right off the cliff of failure.

The thing is, even though I was actually a pretty sharp little kid, none of that potential I had amounted to anything.  I think I was an exceptional child who, through sheer lack of motivation, became an average adult.

I spoke before about a song lyric that applies to my life, or more specifically, the part of my life I describe in this blog.  There’s another song lyric, much less optimistic, that also applies.  From a song called Farewell Mona Lisa:

“Don’t you ever try to be more than you were destined for, or anything worth fighting for.”

That one hits me every time.  I feel like that’s exactly what I did.  I bit off more than I could chew, tried to become something more than I was worth.  And now this is my life: struggling and fighting to do something that I don’t honestly believe I can do, and the thought of doing it scares me senseless.  Fail or succeed, I feel like neither option can end well for me.

All those employers I’ve sent resumes to have been right not to put their trust in me.

Top 5 uses for an MLIS

After 5 years now of having a Master's in Library and Information Science, and spending that much time and counting trying to get full-time (or even half time) employment, I have decided to put together a list of things that an MLIS can actually be useful for.  Here is what I've come up with:

Uses for an MLIS:

-Tuck your degree into your shirt before tackling a plate of ribs.
-Make an incredibly expensive yet stylish paper airplane.
-Wipe away your tears of failure.
-Glare at it while drinking alone each night.
-Give yourself a paper cut to procure the blood necessary to complete the ritual that summons Belphegor, ancient demon of greed, and beg him for a crust of bread.

What an MLIS is NOT useful for:

-Getting a job in the library field, or any field.

Subterranean homelife blues part 2

I mentioned previously that I live in my parents’ basement.  That’s the life of an aspiring librarian: 30 and in a basement.

I’d like to talk a little more about what it will actually be like for you when you’re living in a basement, waiting to find a job that will employ you at least half-time after you get your MLIS.  If you predict that it will suck, you are so incredibly correct.

I recently came to realize that I’ve been living in basements for 12 years now.  As an undergrad at the age of 18 I moved into my grandparents’ basement to be close to my school (I didn’t have a car then), and watch their place when they were away traveling for months at a time.  After my undergrad days I moved back with my parents while getting my MLIS, and have been here since.  My old room was now my sister’s room, and my sister’s old room had been converted into a computer/study room, so I got the basement. 

12 years spent living in ugly, smelly basements.  Basements are going to be ugly and smelly no matter how you dress them up, that’s just the way it is.  You can dress up a pig, but… it’s still a pig, isn’t it?  You know what else a basement is like?  Cold.  Freaking cold.  As I type this it is late Spring, and Spring is actually the coldest time of the year for me.  Winter isn’t that bad because the heat is on, but come Spring the heat gets turned off and I’m sitting here wrapped in blankets, wearing sweatshirts, shivering.  No one as hot as I am should ever have to be this cold.  There are people who have literally frozen to death who have never, in their lives, been as cold as I often am in the Spring.  The only time it’s really nice is Summer, when I’m actually cool while everyone else is suffering from heat stroke.

I could deal with all of that… I mean, it’s not awesome, and I’d still walk around with a general sense of sadness on the inside that has leeched into me from my dank surroundings, but you know, I could deal.  Except for the other thing that is a common fixture of basements that you just can’t fight no matter how much carpet you put down…

Bugs.  Fucking bugs.  Running spiders as big as your hand.  Centipedes.  For those of you not “blessed” to live in a region with house centipedes, just imagine someone took ten long-legged spiders and glued them together.  That’s pretty much a house centipede.  I’d link you to a picture, but then I’d have to see it myself.  Even pictures of them make me uncomfortable.

I have always had a psychotic, paranoid fear of bugs.  I cannot live with having to share a planet with them.  The very thought of it makes me want to cry.  There’s only one thing that gives me just enough peace of mind to sleep knowing those things are skulking around: I sleep with a bug net around my bed.  Well, sort of.  It’s really less of a bug net and more of a pretty princess/harem girl kind of thing, but whatever, it does the job.  I’ve only seen a spider inside the net with me maybe two or three times in these past 8 years.  More often than that I see them outside the net.

I always have spray within reach at all times.  For the past 12 years I’ve been spraying powerful bug poisons near my bed, and I’m not sure exactly how well ventilated these basements are.  And I don’t care.  Lex Luther wore a kryptonite ring until he himself got cancer from it, because he hated Superman that much.  I don’t know how many years I’ve taken off of my life, but it’s something I need to do.  I said I can’t live on the same planet with bugs, and I meant it.  I will slowly kill myself to take as many of them with me as I possibly can.  And yes I realize I’m the supervillain in that analogy, and I’m ok with that.  What, am I going to pretend that someone who has declared all-out war on all bugs—and actually believes that the bugs are aware of this and are fighting back in coordinated efforts—is all that sane?  So sure, I’m the bad guy, I don’t care.  Say hello to the bad guy, you cockroaches.

But God damn, am I ever sick of living in basements.  More than a decade of this… success is really this impossible?  This is the new American way? 

Those of you who are just getting your MLIS, I hope you’re less afraid of bugs than I am.