It is quite possible that I may just be an overly sensitive person, but the following post is not recommended for young viewers, as it may cause crying, gasping, weeping, and other sad tendencies.
As I stated in my last post, I was reading The Dentist of Auschwitz which, as you all know, is about one of the most tragic events in history, The Holocaust. During World War II, the Germans rounded up as many Jewish people they could find, put them to hard labor, and more often than not systematically killed them. More than 6 million people were killed during this time. But why do you ask, am I bringing this matter up?
Well, I am comparing the Holocaust to what they are currently doing to the library. It seems as though many of the periodicals downstairs are rarely read, and therefore do not deserve to loiter the shelves of our basement. Therefore, and I will say this in the most graphic way possible, the books are yanked off the shelves, thrown onto a cart with all of the other periodicals that no longer have a home, then shoved into the elevator, wheeled like cattle to the strategically placed dumpster in the loading dock, and tossed without a second thought.
P.S. Its a recycling dumpster.
It is quite sad in my opinion, even though no one is reading them. In fact, anytime books are tossed, even if they are recycled, I feel a tickle in my throat. All of that knowledge, in the trash. All of the wasted time, effort, schooling, parental raising that it took to create that author and for the author to create that book, is just down the drain.
But alas, not all is sad when it comes to books. Just as old people die, young people are born. Everyday, new books are brought into the University of Portland Library world, to be put on display as their funky fresh selves for all to see. They have shiny new covers, clean and crisp white pages, and they smell new. It is divine. And it makes me smile, just as a new mother smiles at the beloved miracle she holds in her hands.
Signing off
Madison Delaney Blake
Tuesday, August 10, 2010
Monday, August 9, 2010
Interim Week
Silence. Stillness. Calm. Peace. Death?
All words that are synonyms to quiet, as defined by Dictionary.com's Thesaurus, and all words that describe the library at this current time-except for the last one, I hope.
It is interim week. This means the second summer session of classes has ended, and the fall semester will not begin until the 30th of this month. It is an odd time. At this current time, 9:00 on a Monday morning, the library is lifeless. Most of the noise is coming from the full time supervisors behind the circulation desk, and the light above the circulation desk, which, until last week, I had always thought it was the vent making that noise. I was wrong.
Over yonder I can see the student reference librarian, whom at any moment may be impaled by the giant "Ask Us" sign. I'm sure it will happen one day, what with the sign placed merely on fishing line nailed to the ceiling.
But with such nothingness, the library still goes on. Cleaning whiteboards that haven't been used in 3 months, shelving endless children's books, sending our books to other libraries to be enjoyed by students who don't go to UP. Its almost like when parents send their children go college. It is sad, but you know they will be back for a short while, only to leave you again. Finally, at some point, they leave forever. Often by force. This happens at the library too. Its called weeding. A sad time when books that haven't been used for years get the boot. We remove all identity that we ever owned them with harsh permanent markers, and often times they sit and wait for their doom.
OK, maybe it isn't like that in real life, but wouldn't that be sad if it was?
Has anyone ever noticed the striations in the white carpet of the library? It almost reminds me of a terrain maps my stepdad has lying around our house when he is preparing to go hunting. Or the water stains on the ceiling that remind me of clouds. Its almost as if I'm in the woods, with all of the knowledge I need to know at my fingertips.
However, instead i'm sitting at a computer, in a quiet building, reading the Dentist of Auschwitz. Yes. it is quite a Monday morning here at the library. The life of a Student Supervisor may not be that great, but it does have its pluses. Just wait and see....
Signing off,
Madison
All words that are synonyms to quiet, as defined by Dictionary.com's Thesaurus, and all words that describe the library at this current time-except for the last one, I hope.
It is interim week. This means the second summer session of classes has ended, and the fall semester will not begin until the 30th of this month. It is an odd time. At this current time, 9:00 on a Monday morning, the library is lifeless. Most of the noise is coming from the full time supervisors behind the circulation desk, and the light above the circulation desk, which, until last week, I had always thought it was the vent making that noise. I was wrong.
Over yonder I can see the student reference librarian, whom at any moment may be impaled by the giant "Ask Us" sign. I'm sure it will happen one day, what with the sign placed merely on fishing line nailed to the ceiling.
But with such nothingness, the library still goes on. Cleaning whiteboards that haven't been used in 3 months, shelving endless children's books, sending our books to other libraries to be enjoyed by students who don't go to UP. Its almost like when parents send their children go college. It is sad, but you know they will be back for a short while, only to leave you again. Finally, at some point, they leave forever. Often by force. This happens at the library too. Its called weeding. A sad time when books that haven't been used for years get the boot. We remove all identity that we ever owned them with harsh permanent markers, and often times they sit and wait for their doom.
OK, maybe it isn't like that in real life, but wouldn't that be sad if it was?
Has anyone ever noticed the striations in the white carpet of the library? It almost reminds me of a terrain maps my stepdad has lying around our house when he is preparing to go hunting. Or the water stains on the ceiling that remind me of clouds. Its almost as if I'm in the woods, with all of the knowledge I need to know at my fingertips.
However, instead i'm sitting at a computer, in a quiet building, reading the Dentist of Auschwitz. Yes. it is quite a Monday morning here at the library. The life of a Student Supervisor may not be that great, but it does have its pluses. Just wait and see....
Signing off,
Madison
Friday, August 6, 2010
Libraries in Colorado!
It's been a while since I've posted on here, but hey! I'm still here! Well, not at UP here, but I think you catch my drift. Anyway, I hope summer has been treating everyone well! I know mine has had its ups and downs, but I've enjoyed it for the most part. You can find out more on my blog...
So library adventures in Colorado?How does that happen, right? I wasn't even planning on having library adventures as I headed to this Rocky Mountain state in July, but it happened.
For starters, my hotel had a library in it! I didn't get a chance to visit it because people were always in it when I passed by, but it was right next to the elevators so I saw it frequently. It was just a small room filled with books and a few computers. I just didn't know that a library was an amenity at a hotel. Different, eh?
The whole purpose for the trip to Colorado was to attend my cousin's wedding. Best wishes to the bride and groom! While we were outside of the church to see the newlyweds drive off in a limo, I noticed the library across the street! haha I wasn't the only one that noticed either; my cousin's girlfriend asked if it was open. Classic!
Could you imagine having a wedding IN A LIBRARY? The Today show was talking about unconventional ways to have a wedding, and people were getting married at stores, amusement parks, underwater, and dressed up as their favorite comic book or movie. Crazy! Just makes me wonder if a library has ever been a place to hold a wedding ceremony...
Before the close of our trip, we visited Manitou Springs, which is around the Colorado Springs area. Checked out a couple points of interests, like Pike's Peak, Cliff Dwellings, and Cave of the Winds. Driving through town, I found the public library of Manitou Springs. Yes, again, I did not go inside. We were sitting in traffic when I took this picture.
It's cool that Rick and I are checking out or at least seeing different libraries around the country. I definitely think this segment should continue. It would be awesome if we even visited libraries around the world!
Madison and I were discussing how libraries are such a central place for knowledge with all the books. It's truly fascinating, and I think that's what I really enjoy about libraries. You can get lost in a book and uncovering a multitude of facts from cover to cover. It's one of the best feelings to gain new interesting information. :)
Wednesday, August 4, 2010
Library Travels.
On July 10, 2010 a good friend of mine from 6th Grade, Kathryn Fisken, and I traveled down to Seattle. To be specific the University of Washington Campus. Like many of my friends who knew I went down to the UW Campus, I bet you're wondering why we went down there. Well you see, we went because of the following reasons:
Anyways, there was one library in particular that I wanted to visit, and that was the Harry Potter library. It's pretty much the library that looks like the Great Hall from Harry Potter. Unfortunately, the timing Kathryn and I had wasn't the greatest because the library wasn't even open, but here's a picture for you to see what the library looks like, haha.
If you look carefully, you can see that there was a wedding going on at the time. In fact, there were three different weddings going on that day at the campus. For those that don't to UW, the Harry Potter library is actually named Suzzallo. Here's a different shot of the library from a different angle :)
Seeing as Kathryn and I couldn't get into that library, we had to settle for the other library that was open on the weekend during summer session. This library was named Odegaard. Right away I could see many differences from their library compared to ours at the University of Portland. Before any of you start to make comments, I'm aware that their library will be different from ours seeing as they have so many more students than us. I know we can't compare a campus that is about 45,000 students to our 3,000 students. But the differences made it really cool.
If there was something similar between their library and our library, it was that on the main floor there was a place to sit, and look at computers. [Unfortunately, I don't have any photos from our UP library. You'll just have to use your imagination to try picture something up!] This area though is kind of their lobby area, or in our case at UP it's the area that would be near the offices.
One of the other things that caught my attention was the stairs in this library. Obviously, since we have a small library we don't have that many staircases. In fact, we have maybe like one main staircase that takes us between all the three floors in our library. Thinking about it though, the staircase that does take us between all floors isn't placed in the best place within the library, ha. It's a good thing though that the library will be getting a serious makeover!
It was just really cool to see how intricate the stairs were also. I felt like I was in Hogwarts looking at the way the stairs were built, haha. (Me and my Harry Potter love!)
The one last thing I would like to touch base on about UW's library compared to ours was the computer lab. Again, we have a small campus, so there's no need to have more computers. Well, in my opinion I think our library could use some more computers in the computer areas. Yeah, people bring their laptops, but sometimes we need to print things. I might be counting wrong, but the thing is, we have like 8 circular tables in the main part of the library that house 4 computers each. If you look at the photo [click to enlarge it] you can see that there are 8 circular tables with 4 computers each. What's around those tables is obviously more computers. The other thing you guys can't see is that this is only half the computers that they have on this floor. Yes, there's more computers on this floor and the floor above and below this one. CRAZY!!
Right away I kind of got jealous at UW's library, but you know what they need a library like this seeing as they are a larger school. It's a good thing to know though that the library at the University of Portland is getting remodeled. Unfortunately, it won't be during my time. (That just means that I'll have to maybe come visit the library once it's finished and running)
That's it for my library travels, I hope to have more this upcoming school year!
PS. This post is about a month overdue [library joke, haha]. Sorry about that though :)
- I really wanted to visit the library that looks like the Great Hall from Harry Potter. (I'll elaborate on that more in the post)
- I wanted to hang out with Kathryn because she honestly is one of the few friends I have left from that long ago. Also, we just wanted to hang out at UW seeing as she goes there for school.
If you look carefully, you can see that there was a wedding going on at the time. In fact, there were three different weddings going on that day at the campus. For those that don't to UW, the Harry Potter library is actually named Suzzallo. Here's a different shot of the library from a different angle :)Seeing as Kathryn and I couldn't get into that library, we had to settle for the other library that was open on the weekend during summer session. This library was named Odegaard. Right away I could see many differences from their library compared to ours at the University of Portland. Before any of you start to make comments, I'm aware that their library will be different from ours seeing as they have so many more students than us. I know we can't compare a campus that is about 45,000 students to our 3,000 students. But the differences made it really cool.
One of the other things that caught my attention was the stairs in this library. Obviously, since we have a small library we don't have that many staircases. In fact, we have maybe like one main staircase that takes us between all the three floors in our library. Thinking about it though, the staircase that does take us between all floors isn't placed in the best place within the library, ha. It's a good thing though that the library will be getting a serious makeover!It was just really cool to see how intricate the stairs were also. I felt like I was in Hogwarts looking at the way the stairs were built, haha. (Me and my Harry Potter love!)
The one last thing I would like to touch base on about UW's library compared to ours was the computer lab. Again, we have a small campus, so there's no need to have more computers. Well, in my opinion I think our library could use some more computers in the computer areas. Yeah, people bring their laptops, but sometimes we need to print things. I might be counting wrong, but the thing is, we have like 8 circular tables in the main part of the library that house 4 computers each. If you look at the photo [click to enlarge it] you can see that there are 8 circular tables with 4 computers each. What's around those tables is obviously more computers. The other thing you guys can't see is that this is only half the computers that they have on this floor. Yes, there's more computers on this floor and the floor above and below this one. CRAZY!!
Right away I kind of got jealous at UW's library, but you know what they need a library like this seeing as they are a larger school. It's a good thing to know though that the library at the University of Portland is getting remodeled. Unfortunately, it won't be during my time. (That just means that I'll have to maybe come visit the library once it's finished and running)
That's it for my library travels, I hope to have more this upcoming school year!
PS. This post is about a month overdue [library joke, haha]. Sorry about that though :)
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