Volunteer

Back when Jeffrey was still just a month or two old, I started volunteering at the library. It was something I needed to do. It got me out of the house for 2 hours every week, and somewhere where I didn't have to worry about kids, being a mom, or anything other than books.

I had volunteered before at other places...namely the hospital, but Shane and I both felt that volunteering at the hospital so soon after being laid off would not be the best idea on the planet.

Well, volunteering at the library took some getting used to for me. Unlike the hospital where I volunteered before, and really quite unlike any volunteering you would ever get to do (since I was a student exploring different medical fields I got to volunteer in the E.R. and in radiology) and volunteering in the library is very different from that.

Some of the things I do at the library... go through donations and pull the current copy from the shelf that matches it so the librarian can compare the two and decide if they can use the donation or not. Put extra copies for future use away in the basement, look up and pull books that haven't been getting checked out. Look up books that are "lost" and make sure they really are lost. If I find a lost book they get checked in. Go through books that have been pulled to be sold and mark them as withdrawn. Then they get placed on a cart to go out and be put on the for sale shelves. Remove old labels and put new labels on. Clean old stickers off of shelves and bookends, and remove sticky residue from scissors.

Then, today I learned how to cover books with contact paper. I thought that was pretty cool.

Here's why I like volunteering at the library:

-I enjoy it.
-It gets me out of the house.
-The librarians all like me.
-They think I do a great job, which boosts my self image.
-I get to have adult conversation!

The reason it took some getting used to, is they aren't so concerned with things getting done at a lightning fast pace as they are about the job getting done right. I'm still efficient, but not stressed, which is just what I need! Once I learned to relax and focus on getting the job done right, I began to enjoy the peace it began to bring to me. Plus, the librarians, like I said, all think I do a great job.

I guess they have a lot of people volunteer, not like the task they are doing, and just stop coming. So, that is an additional reason why they are happy with me because I've stuck around, and have been there for two years come the end of October.