"I really am a librarian."
There was a time when I thought, "I really am a librarian." This means that I'm so odd or kooky or unpredictable that the statement would seem to be necessary.
But I've been out there on the net and seen what some of you librarians are like, so any surprise at any of your librarian blog behavior is just false. There are some weird motherfuckers out there. Yes, I mean you, weirdie.
When I see the weirder librarians, I want to laugh and ask, "Are you shocking anyone?"
But then I realize that to ask reveals that, I too, believe the librarian stereotype and that this "weirdo" can't possibly want to be what he represents to the world, that some desire to shock is behind it all.
But the truth is, for those of us over the age of 30, that this is it. If you think you are doing something odd to cause alarm, you're only fooling yourself. Because this is it for you. By this time, this weirdo is really who you are.
I look at myself every day and think I can change who I've become. But I don't change because this is me. Every choice has led me here. To change now would admit some failure in my past, like being here is wrong. And I can't isolate any path I've travelled that I would alter.
I would like to have finished college sooner. But then I would probably be a teacher and now unemployed in 2010.
I would like to have slept with lots more women. But then no one would be able to wipe the grin off my face.
So don't treat being a librarian like it should come packaged with any special accessories that you should either embrace or reject. You are you, and being a librarian is what you do.
But if you approach me with your jet-black Bettie Page haircut, ghost white skin, black lipstick, prom queen dress and a vintage Girl Scout sash across your chest, knee-high Doc Martens and tattooed tongues of flame licking up and down your arms, please forgive me if I smile. It's not you. Well, it is you, but it shouldn't be. It's me. And I'm just an ass.