Three Years as Director

A Milestone, An Open House And Some Thoughts Moving Forward

Chartered in 1892, the Griffin Free Public Library is - per capita to community residents - the smallest municipal library in New Hampshire

This week, I celebrate the third anniversary of my appointment as director of Griffin Free Public Library in Auburn.

This journey has been, by far, the most satisfying, aggravating, joyful, frustrating, interesting and perplexing thing I’ve ever done. (And that says a lot. This is basically my fifth career.)

Back in 2014, when I was hired as a one day a week Assistant Librarian, I took the job for two reasons - one, it was a library and two, Little Bean was on her way into the world and I needed a regular, what I called pay-for-her-pre-school, job.

Slowly, little by little, one day and sometimes one hour at a time, I learned what this job meant. To me. To the community. And like it always happens with me, the job became something more.

Under my predecessor, Kathy, who in retrospect was a mentor, I never really learned much about fixing the plumbing or budgeting or staffing. (That would come later.) But I did begin to understand from her that a library was far more than just a building. In particular, a library like ours that’s over a century old, has stories. The library has connections to - as one of my trustees is fond of saying - the kitchen tables of a lot of Auburn residents. And those residents have been and are now family.

The main part of the building remains essentially the same from when this picture was taken around 1906-1910.

In the ten years I’ve been here, I’ve watch kids be born and grow up. I’ve mourned as some of our family have passed. Some have left town. Some have just moved here and begun their lives in town by getting a library card. There is no greater sentence than “I just moved to Auburn and need a library card.”

This building is not mine. It belong to every person who lives here - and in fact, is open to anyone, anywhere, anytime they wish to use it.

I have a lot to learn on what I call my Accidental Librarian journey. I could be better at budgeting. I’m still not really certain how the plumbing works. I tend to enjoy catching up and talking to patrons way more than doing spreadsheets or data entry so I get behind easily. And I rely on a committed and knowledgeable staff to determine what’s our best collection choices for our community.

But I’m also committed to New Librarianship. As one of the oldest institutions in town, we ought to both respond to the needs of our patrons, AND take a leadership role in setting a path forward for our community. We are advocates, information gatherers, teachers, archivists, councilors, guardians, friends and family to every person who walks through those doors. And every person who walks through those doors ought to feel like they belong, like the library is a place for them.

If you need something - anything - ask us. We’ll try like crazy to get it, figure it out, find somebody who can figure it out or provide sympathy if we’re unable to figure it out. (Spoiler alert: Most of the time, we’re able to figure it out.)

The work can be a challenge, especially in these polarized times. But it appeals to me because, like a teacher or a fire fighter, you have to want to be committed. You have to throw yourself into it fully. Some days, it’s a battle. Other days you can see the difference the library makes in the eyes of that kid who picks up a piece of bark mulch in the garden out front and writes his name on it to give to me as a present.

So I carry on. Today, as you read this, the library is holding an Open House with a plant sale, an art show (By Day By Dayer Wayne Merritt) and blue grass music by the Black Pudding Rovers. We’ll be going until 2pm. You should stop by. I’ll talk your ear off about the original tin roof in our museum room, or the grist mill wheel in our garden bed, or what the FREE in Griffin Free Library actually means.

And if you need something. Let us know. We’ll get right to work on that.