Cardigan Diaries | ✓

Chapter 1: An Idea is Planted

What are librarians made of?

Cardigans & advice -

And everything nice.

That's what librarians are made of.

I hummed my modified version of the old nursery rhyme while my experienced eyes scanned the spines of the books. My mission at hand was to find a certain title about knitting. Once it became evident the alphabetization had failed me, I tapped my right foot impatiently and widened my search parameters.

"Come out, come out, wherever you are!" I said in hopes of luring out the fugitive that laid low from me.

Depending on the source, talking to yourself could be an indication of being either unhinged or intelligent. I chose to believe the latter.

"Gotcha!" I said louder than necessary when spotting the book on the row above where it should have been. My main suspect for the disorder was a patron who flipped through the pages, decided not to check it out, then placed it in a random spot. Mildly infuriating but...

Once again super librarian Jane Payne saves the day, I thought while placing the knitting book in my book cart and awarded myself mental bonus points for unintentional rhyming.

Though, why stop there when you could do a victory dance? It probably made me seem more unhinged than intelligent, especially when I ended my dance number with vigorous jazz hands (one simply cannot dance without them). After getting that out of my system, I was ready to continue hunting the rest of the books on my list.

"Good morning!" A woman's voice came behind me.

I turned around to face Wendy, my boss. She acted oddly formal when we exchanged pleasantries and after that, she said the four words no one wants to hear.

"We need to talk."

With racing pulse and sweaty palms, I followed Wendy to the privacy of the reading room. She chose a comfy couch and I kept myself from freaking out by counting the green, old style reading lamps in the room.

"I'm going to cut to the chase," Wendy said and shifted nervously. "I attended an important meeting on Friday and the result is that I have to cut your work hours."

Despite feeling like an elephant parked itself on top of my chest, I managed to ask if there was something wrong with my work performance. My latest possible offenses spun in my head and a few situations came to mind. The patron who wanted a color copy of a black and white original could have complained about me. Or maybe the issue was with my latest story time starting 3 minutes late. There was that one kid side-eyeing me and the clock when it didn't start promptly at noon. Could he have been the offspring of an influential person and tattled on me?

"It's because of the recent budget cuts," Wendy said wrecking my theories. "Your performance has been top notch and if it were up to me, I'd give you full hours. I'm so sorry about this but my hands are tied."

I heard myself say it wasn't her fault and we agreed that from now on I'd be working three days a week.

"If that's all, I have some books to find," I said wanting to escape the situation as soon as possible. Tears of disappointment were burning behind my eyes and it was hard to act casual. In my books, being sensitive was a strength and nothing to be ashamed of. But with that being said, there were certain situations I didn't want to cry openly. Like in front of my boss. Wendy nodded and I made my way back to my book cart.

A few stubborn tears managed to escape and I wiped them away with the sleeve of my favorite, forest green cardigan.

Get your act together, 'super librarian'.