Let’s explore the similarities between workers in restaurants and workers in libraries. Chefs and staff in restaurant kitchens work hard to prepare elaborate, creative meals but are rarely able directly to experience the results of their efforts. The servers, however, describe the dishes and suggest items, bring the plates to the table, observe the diners’ reactions to the food, respond to their compliments (“This is delicious!”) while the busy chefs and clean-up crews are stirring sauces and scraping dirty pots.

After seven years in the Catalog Department, I knew that, as a career, it was not for me. I loved libraries, but the tedium and isolation of dealing with 3x5 index cards, altering and adjusting them and re-typing them and filing them, while fascinating at times (and enjoyable when I actually had a chance to look at the books they represented), led me to realize increasingly that I didn’t want to be a cataloger forever. I began to question whether I was suited for library work.

When I was “pinking and pulling” (yanking cards out of the card catalog, replacing them with pink slips to hold their places while corrections were made), library users would sometimes approach me to ask a question—and that would brighten my day! Cheerfully I’d point them to the location they inquired about (most often, of course, the restrooms), and happily help them understand the detail on the cards themselves.

I don’t think I fully realized, in those days, that my problem was not that I was working in a library; it was the type of work I was doing in the library. I was not well-suited to the (for me) grunge work that’s essential to library operations: the acquisition and processing of materials, cataloging them and preparing them for availability on the shelves, or withdrawing them, or correcting their catalog records. In libraries of that era, those functions occurred in the departments within Technical Services: Acquisitions, Cataloging, and Processing. Working as a cataloger, I had to continuously remind myself that the work I was doing would ultimately help people get their hands on the information they required or wanted, but it all seemed remote. Did anyone really care? Did these endless trays of small, stiff paper cards really get readers to the books they wanted to read? (Are diners out there in the restaurant enjoying their meals?)

But there was another world out there: the world of Public Services. Ultimately, I came to realize that was where I belonged. People in Public Services work directly with students, faculty, other staff, and the general public to guide them in locating the information they need. Like servers in a restaurant, Public Services librarians and staff introduce patrons and clientele to the rich, enticing menu of library materials to satisfy their hunger for deeper knowledge.

My new appointment as Head of the Morrison Library led me firmly into the world of Public Services. And to the realization that a career in librarianship was appropriate, and well within my capabilities and talents.

Day One in the Morrison Library, the beautifully appointed recreational reading room within the Main Doe Library at UC Berkeley: a faculty member approached me as I sat at the desk while the student assistant was on a break. “Hey, I’m really stressed out today. Can you recommend something relaxing to read?” A little light lit up within my heart and soul. “Yes, yes! How about this book? The writing is delightful; the author has a fine sense of humor…” Full of smiles, the faculty member sat down with the book in one of the softly comfortable armchairs. I could hear her quietly laughing off and on over the next half hour…

I was in the dining room at last. I was helping the patrons. I was home.

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