"Storytime" and Other Atrocities

I don't normally get assigned to work in the children's department at the bookstore, but today I worked 9-5. Which apparently included a "Storytime" [sic] in the morning. The manager told me to read a couple of books. No problem; I've done that in the school library. I wasn't so much uncertain about my ability to read as I was what to read to these kids, who obviously were not yet school age.

It may sound weird, but I drew on my observations of the autism support classes at the elementary school library--and fortunately I found at least one of the books that the students liked to check out. I even asked the little girl who insisted on sitting next to me on the "stage" to turn the pages for me. (She came up to me afterwards and asked me to read her another story. That was enjoyable.)

Some of the moms/grandmoms, however, were really pieces of work. After I'd read two books and wanted to stop, one asked in an irritated manner, "I was led to believe 'Storytime' was thirty minutes." Whoa. Whatsa matter, lady, can't keep a kid occupied on your own?

I kept my cool and told her that's all I had picked out, but I could read another one if she had a suggestion. She then irritated me further by asking bluntly, "Can you read one that's more for girls?"

You know what, lady? I picked these stories more for the illustrations and the comprehension level. Most kids your daughter's age like the Cat in the Hat, trucks, and farm animals. Except in your sexist world, a story doesn't require mention of a purse or ballet shoes to appeal to a girl.

Again, kept my cool: "Do you have a suggestion?" This one. I didn't know it, so it wasn't exactly my best reading. . . but it took me to over the thirty-minute mark, and that was all that mattered. Reading to that little girl who came up afterwards helped mitigate that irritation, thankfully.

Seriously, though--"storytime" at a bookstore? This is the kind of thing that libraries do. They have websites and flyers to advertise them--there's a really good one not far from the bookstore, in my hometown. Parents/grandparents should get to know the local libraries.

Instead, I've got people showing up and treating the bookstore like a library. They hang out for hours and never buy a thing, and leave the place a mess, including damaged books, in their wake. Heck, they go a step further and spill coffee everywhere. They wouldn't dare do that at a library. Do they have the wrong idea about what goes on the library? Or do they just think it's too declasse to go to the library?

A lot of people wonder why prices go up, and the economy falls on hard times, and libraries close. So many don't have a clue, when one thing that could go a long way to making the local economy better is a little interest in being a regular library patron and a genuine consumer. Decide what you value, and act on those decisions. Otherwise, you have little right to complain.