I have questions. Questions that need answers...

Day 2 of library school. Several of us are feeling a certain information overload - that feeling that your brain is going to explode. One of the professors suggested that we use duct tape to keep our heads together, because masking tape just won't do the job.

What is information? What is a document? What is a collection? Who are the users? What is a library? What about boundaries? Is Yahoo's new digitization project going to create a library? Is a digital library really a library?

And who freakin' cares??!?

No one, that's who. Well, only us library-types. Yep, that's one thing I learned today. See, 'information professionals' love this stuff. We love the process involved in how to find a book or article or some random piece of information. We love the search. But 99% of people - they could care less how you find something, they just want it and they want it now. This explains everything! Like that story of the book I found for someone in the library... I love to tell all the places I looked and how I found it, etc. When I tell people this story, their eyes glaze over. Who cares!! Boring! But it's still fun for me.

So did I mention on the orientation day I found a woman who is also interested in international work? I chatted with her today and she had some more information to give me.

First, one of the chapters of a campus group is focused on International library work. I'm going to check them out.
My friend said that basically I wouldn't get the international library work flavor I'm looking for here at this school. There is a track for that at UCLA, if I want to transfer. I will really have to design my own program to look the way I want to get the most out of it.

Hmm, I thought. Is this what I want to do? I don't want to transfer to UCLA! Maybe this is too hard. It's going to take too much work. And will I even come out knowing what I ned to know? Yep, I'm afraid I really did think this. I'm kind of a wimp.

But then I was thinking of alternatives. I guess I could be a reference librarian. That's the thing that's interested me the most. Could I be a reference librarian for the rest of my life? Work in a public or university setting... I know the atmosphere would be fine, I'd probably enjoy the people. But then I knew I just wouldn't be happy. I wouldn't be fulfilled that way. I would be missing out.

So onward I go, still trying to define what it is I want to do and how I want to serve in the world...