Love YOUR Library!

It's National Library Week (April 14-20, 2013), so I am feeling especially proud of libraries and librarianship. As a children's librarian in a public library, there aren't many days that I am not advocating the important role that public libraries play in our community. As a child, the public library was our summer go-to place! My siblings and I would gather piles of books to read, go to fun family programs consisting of magicians, stories, and movies, and play with computer and board games that we didn't have at home. We spent many a hour at our library and I remember our children's librarian, Mrs. Butterfield, as clear as day!


This past fall, I was fortunate enough to go the Broken Umbrella's play The Library Project presented at The New Haven Free Public Library. Discovering this performance was truly a wonderful accident, I had picked up a bookmark advertising the performance at a New Haven coffee shop. A special after-hours performance through the halls of the beautiful and historic New Haven Free Public Library, where participants "pay what they can"! I was sold!  (See a Yale Daily News review here.)

"The Library Project" was a true collaboration of the people of New Haven and this evening inspired me greatly. Theater-goers were treated to seven short plays throughout the library lead by a "librarian-guide" with a brightly lit umbrella. Though each performance was unique in it's own way, I was most moved by the performance "Branching Out". This play took place in the children's room where 3 young actors lead you on a walk through the children's department quoting wonderful stories and singing along the way. We were lead to a big beautiful "tree" whose leaves and branches were hundreds of card catalog cards filled with memories of public libraries. As the actors sang their song, they invited each of us to write our own memories of libraries. Questions included: Why is the Library special to you? What is your first memory of a library? What is your favorite nook in the Library? It was one of these moments that made me so proud to be a librarian! My library is an important place in our community and I trust that the families we serve our making memories too. As I stood there listening to the song and watching people happily submit their stories, I could do nothing but cry.What a wonderful job I have!
  

Though months have gone by, I still tell anyone that will listen about Broken Umbrella and "The Library Project". Have your own library story? Go to the Houghton Mifflin website to share a memory! (You might win a copy of the book "Miss Moore Thought Otherwise".) Or even better, if you have memories of my library, Otis Library in Norwich, CT, enter our You@Otis Library Contest! Like us on Facebook and share your memory via a message to us!