the next stop

So, last week at work was torturous - I was pulled in 1,000 emotional directions and it shouldn't be that way, but it is. There are times when I think I'm actually driving a public bus disguised as a public library. I work in a lovely place, but I'm always a few yards from very tense situations and then really meaningful interactions with folks, e.g. the slippery slope of porn and the man who is practically jerking off at the computer. Folks having shouting matches over cell phones. Kids following a developmentally disabled teen around the library, laughing at him and taking pictures of him with their cell phone cameras. The missing child. The crying mother. The sheriffs looking for him. He's five. The phonecall from a man who is crying and tells me that the library has done so much for him and he doesn't have much to give but he'd like to give something. A used book? Would that be enough? I put the man on hold for a few short seconds - a coworker says to me in this time, "Librarians don't do anything around here." It wasn't sarcastic. And then I finished the week with the young child (maybe 6 tops?) who wants to look up her friend's website ("Dub Dub Connor Dot Com" she thinks it might be). He has cancer and he is 10 and he is brave.