WTF? or Pleasantly Surprised!

I have resumed my jobsearch in earnest, and the feedback has been astonishing...I've been called back and conducted telephone interviews already twice now within less than a month of starting my jobsearch...Guess the old showbiz cliche about "no bad publicity" is also partly true about "library experience"...professional library experience is still experience, even if you f*cked up in your last job. Actually the f*ck up in my last job really was just as much my clueless, ditzy director's fault as it was my own, but anyway. I'm serious, though, I NEVER expected the 2nd time on the job search path to be like this...suddenly I'm like a hot commodity or something where fresh out of library school it was a pretty tough sell. I'm getting called back by mid-sized universities...all of them bigger than TAMUG, thank goodness. I got called by one just north of Houston (cataloging) , one in extreme South Texas affiliated with the t-sips (reference!), and now one in far northeastern Missouri (cataloging). I've interviewed for the first two by phone already, and have a phone interview for the third on Wednesday. The NE Missouri school is a premier liberal arts institution in that region and they teach A LOT of foreign languages there, which means I might actually get to deal with German and other Foreign Language Monographs quite a lot more than I ever would've anywhere else so far. I'm really hopeful about this one. Maybe a chance to really learn Cataloging properly, the way it's supposed to be learned/done, e.g. hands on with a mentor always at hand, working with subject matter I truly love. They just may make a decent cataloger out of me yet. Wish me luck.

I felt strangely ambivalent about the position in South Texas, mostly because I don't know much about South Texas or what it would be like to live there. My gut reaction was negative, then looking at photos on flickr of the town, its environs, etc, reinforced some of that negativity. But then looking at their book holdings, and their curriculum...I felt a little better--and at least it would be a Reference job, which despite my best efforts at Cataloging, is probably still my forte in the long run. The phone interview went alright, but I know it was rougher and less prepared sounding that I probably would've liked. I had really just applied to the position on a lark, I didn't seriously believe they'd actually call me back...and so I guess I was caught a little of guard when they actually did. Another thing I like, I happen to know the Socialist Party of Texas (such as it is) is active down in the Rio Grande Valley (I get their emails), so it would be something I could hook up with if I felt like it. Reynosa, Mexico, is the nearest town across the border from where I'd probably move to if this t-sip library actually did make an offer and I accepted...and I would accept, no bones about it. I had my reservations before the interview, but now that I've had more time to think about it, absolutely I'd go to South Texas, no matter what, if they promised me a decent professional library job at a fair salary. I'm single, no girlfriend, no kids, no car payments, no mortgage payments--I'm free as a bird--Have MLS, Will Travel, baby. I could always fly in and out of Harlingen, TX on Southwest Airlines if I got homesick for Houston. Besides, they do teach French at this place, and the Rio Grande Valley has an organisation simliar to Alliance Francais, promoting French language and culture. Vive la difference, vive la France!!

The other library just north of Houston would be alright, too. It's a decent sized college, again better than my last one. I'd not plan on staying there long term, mind you, but it would be another good place to pick up experience, even if the materials I'd be cataloging weren't nearly so interesting as the potential items I might get to work with in Missouri. Although I'm familiar with Missouri, and my parents are both from there, neither one of them has been to this particular part of extreme Northeast Missouri...it's further North than St. Louis...quite a bit further North, in fact. Snow would be a definite reality every winter up there. It'd be a real test whether or not I really do like more northern climates like I say I do. But I do know that at least as far as weather goes, I definitely preferred Denton, Tx, where I went most of my time in library school, to my (semi-)native Houston. People are a different question, but I liked Denton, with its cooler fall temperatures, prettier leaves, and guaranteeed at least 1 or 2 perfect "snow days"...just enough to be beautiful without being annoying.

This part of Missouri is a small college town....rural, yes, but also seat of a major (if small) state university focused on liberal arts. It would be reminiscent of College Station. It's depressingly saturated with churches, of course, and not a UU congregation among them, either. And good ol' St. Louis, with the fabulous Saint Louis Rationalist Society, is over 100 miles away, much much further away than Mineral Area College would have been (one of the schools I actually did a face-to-face interview with but didn't get the job). Still, the town...or at least the campus, sounds like it would be an oasis of liberal-minded thinking in an otherwise more conservative area. The University itself sounds very cool and I like the way they organize their curriculm, especially for foreign languages. I mean WOW, they have RUSSIAN! In Missouri!! Amazing. As much as I'd like to pick up French, maintaining and building on my Russian skills would be even better.

October in Houston has been an amazing month for cultural stimulation...so many great films recently, both at Rice Media Center and MFAH; I've been so caught up in things I actually missed one of the ones I was dying to see, the new Jan Svankmajer film Lunacy (Sileni). At least I got to see the pair of American animators who draw their greatest inspiration from this Czech master, namely the Brothers Quay, who contributed heavily to the new film The Piano Tuner of Earthquakes...a poetic science fantasy horror-suspense art film, kind of. You just have to see it, there's no adequate label for it. It's strange, it's fun, it's classic Brothers Quay expanded to feature length movie making, much the same way Svankmajer broke new ground with his retelling of FAUST, etc, after doing animated shorts for many years.

Last night I caught a documentary in Spanish on the life and death of Salvador Allende, former President of Chile. I'll post more at length later; it was a powerful film, but deeply saddening.

Aside from the flooding rains of last week, we have had a couple of cold fronts lately in Houston that have given us some wonderful and genuinely Fall weather. It doesn't last, of course, but it's nice when it happens. Makes me get out and walk more...I love the smell in the air when the air is cool and crisp. Love wearing sweatshirts and jeans...wish it was like this a whole lot more often, y'know?

That's it for now for the Aggie Librarian; I'm just pleased as a peach to get so many phone interviews so quickly this time around...makes me hopeful I'll be getting back in the game a whole lot sooner than I expected. I was anticipating a tough slog, but I'll take a quick, decisive victory if it's within my grasp!