Each bimonthly issue of The Bookworm, the Middleton Public Library’s newsletter features a brief profile of a staff member. For the last issue of 2007, Liz Dannenbaum, Head of Adult Services and de facto newsletter editor, selected the Retiring Guy and asked me to answer the following questions. Unlike a face-to-face interview, I get to ponder my answers.
(Current issue of The Bookworm found at http://www.midlibrary.org/library/newsletter/default.asp)
How does it feel to be the director of the "Library of the Year"?
I'm very proud of the recognition it gives us for the great things we do. And it’s an especially well-deserved honor for a hard-working staff and a very supportive community. I don’t know how meaningful this statistic is … but each Middleton library staff member – and we have a total of 20 fulltime-equivalent employees – is responsible for 36,000 circulations. The state average is 18,000. (Oops! Maybe I shouldn’t have mentioned this. Everyone is going to want to be paid double what they earn now!)
As wonderful as it is to be selected as the Library of the Year, I still find what's most gratifying are the frequent expressions of satisfaction I hear from people who use the library – mostly along the lines of…”You have such a friendly and helpful staff!”
Now that you've decided to retire next summer from this job, what do you look forward to doing after that?
I look at next year not so much as a transition to retirement but as an opportunity to reformat my career. My options will include teaching, consulting, and perhaps even serving as an interim library director on a short-term basis. After my dad retired, having served 38 years as a Lutheran minister, he still found himself in the pulpit on an occasional Sunday morning. (I never asked him if he recycled his old sermons.)
As for other things, I should be able to give more attention to the blog I just started (“Retiring Guy”) and write the short stories that have been percolating inside my head for the past 30 years. I also have some ambitious home landscaping projects in mind and plan to do a lot more bicycling.
Sounds like I’m going to be busier than ever, doesn’t it? Where’s the hammock time?
What are you reading these days?
Right now I’m re-reading After This, by Alice Dermott, in preparation for the library’s October book discussion. I have to admit that much of my reading – and reading plans – of late has me focusing on favorite titles: Confederacy of Dunces, Rabbit Run (and the rest of this series), and Gone South, this last title by the inexplicably neglected, nearly forgotten, it seems, Robert McCammon.
Now that you've decided to retire next summer from this job, what do you look forward to doing after that?
I look at next year not so much as a transition to retirement but as an opportunity to reformat my career. My options will include teaching, consulting, and perhaps even serving as an interim library director on a short-term basis. After my dad retired, having served 38 years as a Lutheran minister, he still found himself in the pulpit on an occasional Sunday morning. (I never asked him if he recycled his old sermons.)
As for other things, I should be able to give more attention to the blog I just started (“Retiring Guy”) and write the short stories that have been percolating inside my head for the past 30 years. I also have some ambitious home landscaping projects in mind and plan to do a lot more bicycling.
Sounds like I’m going to be busier than ever, doesn’t it? Where’s the hammock time?
What are you reading these days?
Right now I’m re-reading After This, by Alice Dermott, in preparation for the library’s October book discussion. I have to admit that much of my reading – and reading plans – of late has me focusing on favorite titles: Confederacy of Dunces, Rabbit Run (and the rest of this series), and Gone South, this last title by the inexplicably neglected, nearly forgotten, it seems, Robert McCammon.
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