The Last First Day of School Picture

Tuesday, June 19, 2012
The camera batteries looked good.
I took out Troy's little School Days Book that
I had bought when he started kindergarten.
It bulged with thirteen years of report cards
tucked neatly into the pouches along with class pictures,
scout certificates, sport pictures, choir programs
and other miscellaneous stuff I'd slid inside.
As I leafed through the pages,
I paused at his first grade picture.
He was wearing a tiny sport coat and tie
and his eyes were seriously bug-eyed.
I remembered when he came home with his first grade picture.
His eyes were closed.
Two weeks later we got a picture retake notice
and went into the bathroom so he could look in the mirror
and practice keeping his eyes open.
He opened them so wide that he looked like he'd seen a ghost.
We laughed and laughed.
As he went out the door to the school bus with his dad,
I called out to him, "Don't forget to keep your eyes open!"
He turned and opened his eyes as wide as they could go
and yelled back, "Like this mommy?!"
He knew I would laugh and was rewarded appropriately.
As I look at his little School Days Book,
I always turn to that page.
His first grade picture
with that frozen startled expression.
I can still hear little his voice.
"Like this mommy?!"

My First Webinar Presentation

Sweat popped out on my forehead
as I looked at my computer screen.
Panic began to rise within me.
I was looking at trailers
and other farming equipment,
NOT library supplies.
Beth's voice sounded far away as she said,
"You typed it in wrong, try again."
I told myself to breath and
I started over in the search engine
and the Demco Library supplies website
came up and I was flooded with relief.
At least if I fail at librarianship I know
that THE OTHER Demco has great tractors!
I only like technology when it works.
I was so eager to try to present during
our webinar class that it didn't occur to me
that I could make a complete fool of myself.
That's a bit odd since I seem so good at it.
Online classes are a new animal to me
and one I'm not always fond of.
I like real people, but at least with this
Saturday morning collection development class,
I get to go to school in my jammies
and swill hot coffee.
Our instructor is in Chicago and we have classmates
in Saudi Arabia, China and Turkey that join
our local ranks in the pursuit of librarian degrees.
I concentrated on the substitute job I had Friday
and the posters on the wall of the Dewey Decimal system.
I had memorized Demco from the posters
and ordered a set on my lunch break
to prepare for spring quarter.
My search came back to me and I carefully
followed the links of products to the one I wanted to share.
With relief I stared at photographic posters
of the Dewey Decimal system with call numbers.
My instructor said, "Good job Gretchen. "Next week
everyone will get to take a turn as webinar presenter."
Our webinar class allows us to share anything
on a screen globally. From websites to texts to power points.
It is called Information Literacy.
And it takes PRACTICE.