Shelf Life

I try not to point fingers, everyone. I really do. Who am I to point a finger at anyone else for anything? Me, who watches "So You Think You Can Dance" and rewinds and watches the routines twice? Me, who is almost always the first one to leave a party? Me, who, at times, can't tell the difference between Toto and Loverboy?

HOWEVER. I just have to point this one out. It's too shocking. And I am warning you that if you are not a librarian, or don't use the library, this post may be the equivalent of three or four quaaludes being injected directly into your jugular. So be it. I just can't keep silent about this any longer. It's too unsettling.

I have a friend who lives in a ginormous metropolitan city. One of the top five largest cities in the U.S. I don't want to say which one, because, you know, I'm trying to be graceful within the confines of this conversation. Who cares if I am talking shit about something? I will have my pinky finger up and speak in a genteel manner even as I do so. So, she lives in this big city. And this city has a large, historic, well-established library system. And here's what she asked me.

Her: In your library system, how do you shelve your fiction?
Me: By author.
Her: And then what?
Me: Just by author.
Her: You know, at my library, they shelve the fiction by last name of the author only, and then by title.
Me: Say whaaaaa?

Are you all getting this? Do you understand the sheer wrongness of what's going down over there in that metropolis she's living in? Last name of author and then TITLE? Let me break this down for you.

Let's say that you read the novel called Selfish and Perverse and loooved it. And really, with a name like that, who wouldn't? So you figure, because you are smart this way, that maybe you'll like something by the same author. You mosey over the the fiction shelf and look for the author, Bob Smith. There's all the Smiths (minus Morrissey maybe, har har), together on the shelf. Only all the Bob Smiths are not together. Because first, the books have been shelved by last name. All the Smiths. Together. THEN, the books are shelved by TITLE. So Alice at Heart, by Deborah Smith would come first, then next to that would be Cry Wolf by Wilbur Smith, and then Deadly Grace by Taylor Smith, and so on like that. So all the Bob Smith books would not be right next to each other. Not collocated, as we librarians like to say. So in a yooge library, the Smiths might take up stacks of books, and if you just wanted all the Bob Smiths, you would have to browse every Smith book there.

I know librarians read this blog. I can hear you breathing out there. Tell me, have you ever heard of this shelving system before? And if, perchance, you work for this library system of which I speak (or another one that shelves this way), can you tell me why this is happening? Because that is not practical and that is not orderly. And as a librarian, I must have the practical and the orderly. At least when it comes to items on the shelf. When it comes to knowing the difference between Toto and Loverboy however, I can slide into the sloppy and the useless.

HEY. Non-librarian readers! STOP SNORING. As Stephanie Tanner used to say: how rude.

Kiss the rings, I'm out.
Librarian Girl