I’m starting to use my librarian super powers and I’m not even a librarian.

There is a little girl who I taught to read last year. She is a lovely Hispanic girl, and her Mom brings her into the library weekly. I was blessed to be there the moment she “got” reading. She put her sounds together and her letters together and was able to read an unfamiliar word. She lit up. I gave her another word, and another. She nailed each one.

There is a problem now, a year later. Now she is getting only DVDs. I noticed this a few weeks ago and I said to her – “Get books. No more DVDs”. It didn’t work. I saw her last week getting the maximum number of DVDs – 10, and no books. She was standing on a step stool, looking through all the movies. She was at my height at this point.

I looked straight at her and said “Don’t let me think that I wasted my time teaching you how to read and all you are getting is DVDs. Go get books.” I pointed towards the books and away from the DVDs. She looked a little freaked out.

I’ll see how this plays out. If it comes to it I’ll have to learn how to say in Spanish to her Mom that she must get books. Mom doesn’t speak English at all. Her children have to do all the talking for her when they are out because they learned English in public school.

Part of the problem is that this girl is used to having her way. She is very cute and very pigheaded. I can tell she has her parents wrapped around her finger. Perhaps Mom and Dad understand the value of a good education, but they don’t quite get how important it is for parents to get involved in that education.

In order to be an actual librarian you have to have a Master’s degree in Library Science. I don’t. I just work in a library. I have a Bachelor’s in English. But everybody thinks that because I work in a library, I’m a librarian.

Working in a library is a lot like working retail, but with better public opinion. People think we are like teachers. They grant us more respect than in retail work. We are somewhat authority figures. I’m not sure why, but I’m using it anyway. As long as I use my powers for good, why not?