Director’s Thoughts – 9/9/2020

The last Director’s Thoughts post I wrote was back in May. Where do I even begin? From mid-June through August we offered curbside pickup at our library while planning for reopening. And today, for the first time in almost six months there were patrons in our library! It was so great to see how much the library changed when you added in the people we serve.

Every day of the past few months has felt like a year and yet, I can’t believe it’s already September. Not unlike most of you, I’ve missed trips to see family and friends, we’ve canceled summer plans and visits to explore other countries. And in a blink of an eye, it’s already September.

But through it all, I’ve continued to work. And as crazy as the library has been over the past few months, it’s been somewhat of a constant too. There have been days that I get home and can barely keep my eyes open long enough to eat dinner, but all the planning has finally come to a point where it can be helpful.

And since March, I kept reminding myself that we are making a difference in our community, even if we couldn’t have patrons actually inside the building. And seeing masked (and smiling) faces coming through our doors was truly a sight for sore eyes.

We were only open for five hours and almost everyone that came through our doors commented on how much they missed the library. It was busier than I expected it would be which was exciting and exhausting, but overall I think the day went very smoothly.

My hope is that in the next few weeks, we’ll open more fully and be able to bring back the rest of our staff. That is, as long as the coronavirus case count stays low in our area. My biggest fear right now is that the cases will spike or someone on staff will test positive and then we have to close the building again.

But for now, I’m going to take today as a success. And I’ll focus on one day at a time and know that our community missed our space and are excited to see us again!