StandUpLibrarian.com: 2020

I can't believe it has been 10 years since I created Stand-Up Librarian. Happy 10th Anniversary to me (funny how I just totally ignored the 9th anniversary I guess.)

Once again, I am completely overwhelmed and exhausted to try and summarize my thoughts of the past 10 years because for the past 2 months, I have been sewing face masks all day, every day, to help fight this Covid-19 pandemic. So far I have sewed 1,522 masks in just under 2 months, something I never envisioned would ever be my full-time job way back in 2010. But here I am, busy as ever! If you need one, pop over to my Etsy shop!

I think when I do look back to the weekend in 2010 when I decided to combine my comedy career with my library degree and create Stand-Up Librarian, I just wanted to be of service. I thought using my sense of humor and love of reading to promote literacy and libraries in fun ways while I applied for library jobs would be both productive for me and beneficial for the library community. As I had a background in public relations (and I knew how expensive those services cost), I thought offering my PR services for free to libraries, authors, and anyone in the book community would be appreciated. I had so many fun ideas of things I wanted to do! So I did them (mostly alone, unfortunately, as not everybody always understood them at first which was often sad and confusing to me, but thankfully, I had enough confidence in myself and some great friends and family supporting me to continue to stand-up to the challenges I faced and not quit.

My favorite book has always been The Alchemist by Paulo Coelho. It is a story about pursuing your dreams but learning along the journey of the treasures you have always carried within. I have countless copies of this book from the many journeys I have been on in my life, highlighting and making notes in these paperbacks when I reread it every year whenever I felt lost or my path unclear. It has taken me years to realize that applying for jobs and trying to fit in the qualifications of a job descriptions was a pointless task utilizing hours of my time that should have been put into myself. When I created Stand-Up Librarian, I had the hope that someone would discover me and see my passion for libraries and hire me. After five long years and hundreds of job applications later, someone finally did. But he met me as the Stand-Up Librarian, wearing a book dress I made and selling my literary purses and accessories at a book fair I was the spokesperson for. I had also performed my literary parody songs the night before and been featured in several newspapers. He would later hire me without my ever having to apply for the job or offer a resume. I would spend the next five years building a library from scratch where I would also become friends with a co-worker who loved to read as much as I did and would eventually become my husband. I share this story because some of the best things in life happen because you create the things that make you happiest and then the right opportunities find you.

Lastly, I figured I would share ten of my favorite things I accomplished over the past ten years. Some were crazy ideas that became goals to attain and others just came out of left field and turned into incredible adventures I never could have planned. I am so grateful to all of my friends and fans that I have been there with me the past 10 years attending my shows, buying items from my shop, reading my blog and news articles, following me on social media, and for all the literary love you have shared with me. Thank you so much.

So, Happy 10th Anniversary Stand-Up Librarian. I got you the perfect gift...