Since I started working in correctional libraries I have not had a chance to be bored and that is the way I like it. From the moment I leave my car to the movement I get back into it to go home, there is something for me to do. Just an example of what my day can be like: Arrive at the institution about 11:45 am.
I have always know that movies about prison life been out there, hey I was one of those glued to the TV watching OZ and Prison Break, but until I started researching this topic I had no idea how extensive the draw of prison life was for people. A blog, using wordpress.com http://www.prisonflicks.com/ reviews prison movies, many of them from the 70s and 80s, and the earliest one I found Bridge on the River Kwai (1957) starring William Holden.
This is the question everyone always asks, when you tell them you work in a prison library. The next being, have you ever seen Shawshank Redemption? The question is asked with all innocence and with no real aspect of what it is like to work in a prison. So you have to laugh and tell them what it is really like. Here is my answer when people ask me: Sometimes. The daily basis of my job is just like anyone else who works in a library, except I may have to go through a few more doors and gates then the average library worker.
I had been on the job for 6 months and felt that I was finally getting the hang of working in a prison, but then things are not always as they seem. I was called up to the counter to help an inmate and after a few basic routine questions went back to my desk. Soon I realized my pen was missing, damn where did I put that thing? The pen was one of my favorites from home and I loved the way it wrote so smoothly. I decided to check up at the counter, maybe I had taken it up there, but no pen. I wasn’t sure what to say or do. Do I confront them or let it slide?
Modern technology assures that no library staff is really alone, separated by miles, walls and fences perhaps but everyone is only a fax, phone call or email away. It is required that we check our email twice a day and respond. We share reference questions and circulation problems, coordinate efforts in coverage of absent library staff, illness or rare vacations and all through electronic transmissions. Still, it would be best if we would get together and share our experiences, training, trials and triumphs with each other face to face. You know, like real people do.
[caption id="attachment_8" align="alignnone" width="300" caption="In the News"]
[/caption]
The Washington State Penitentiary West Complex opened its new 2,047 square foot library on Monday June 23, 2008.
Well, The News Tribune article about the Library I keep open showed up Sunday morning. I am not a real librarian (MLS) to those that know, but am to those that want one and only get me. Nice picture, Mister Lui Kit Wong, you are even better than I anticipated - made me wish I was that nice looking guy in the picture. Brian Everstine hit the right note, and wasn't jarring in his report, you the readers may make up your mind about what could be done.
Sometimes we need a reminder that we mean something to the world - it seems to ignore my wishes so well. I was telling my program manager (yes, I am part of the programmed) that the stories we need to tell the Legislature are the ones about inmates that leave our libraries and become good citizens. But then good citizens don't get in the news too much, do they? And I guess if I were jailed with Martin Luther King, Jr.
