Apparently, several friends think I have “the coolest job” — this, I discovered after posting this status update to Facebook this morning:
this week, work is all about anarchy — specifically a collection of anarchist publications and ephemera held by UVic Special Collections
I have switched gears a lot in the past 10 workdays covering: theses and dissertations from the Spring 2010 convocation, Communist Chinese Posters, Dickens’ Little Dorrit in serial form, and now anarchist newsletters from the 70s and 80s — so it hasn’t been boring. Also waiting in the wings is a request for a specific issue of the Malahat Review and a box of vintage Vancouver Island postcards (pictured, right).
For someone with a History and Lit degree, I’ll admit I do enjoy seeing and holding these things and I get a real thrill telling people about them — I love to showcase what is available not just for scholars but for anyone who chooses to use the UVic Libraries and by mounting these collections on the web, their reach is further expanded.
Sometimes though, I forget how cool it is. The job is not without its monotony and its tech frustrations, and no job is entirely free of internal politics, either. I frequently daydream about what I would do if I didn’t have to go into work every day and sometimes come home threatening to cash out, buy an RV, and take ThoseDeWolfes on the road. Mondays are especially hard for me — it’s not that I dread the job, it’s that I miss the more flexible weekend schedule.
So, I asked my friends to remind me how cool my job is on those days when the RV is looking like the best option. I trust that they will.