Elizabethport Public Library

This is a post I made for Open Salon (http://open.salon.com/content.php?cid=56447), who were looking for writers on the subject of "the worst job I ever had...":

It may not be the worst, but a job I had was as a desk clerk for the Elizabethport Public Library in Elizabeth, NJ. An off-shoot of the main branch, this was a tiny building that sat less than a mile from Newark airport, directly under the flight path. The defeaning roar of an airbus every two minutes was about the most exciting thing that happened there - the library had only English books in a mostly Spanish speaking neighborhood. The only customer I remember was a man in a torn jacket that smelled like piss who sometimes wanted to use the copy machine.

I sat at the main desk for eight hours every day, trolling the internet till I had spots in my vision. My co-worker, a Hispanic woman who ate foul smelling chicken for lunch in the break room, told me that the library didn't allow the clerks to read books while they were working. Apparently we were supposed to be making sure all the books were in order. The irony of a library that didn't allow its employees to read didn't escape me.

I was home from college for the summer and I was still sitting at home watching Jerry Springer in mid-July, so the library job was actually a bit of a blessing. And I do have a few fond memories from the second half of that summer. Every day, I met my friend Bekah at the mall for lunch. She'd watch me eat a Ranch One Chicken sandwich and waffle fries, and then we'd cruise by Lids for Less or Sam Goody's. I remember buying The Soft Bulletin by the Flaming Lips after reading glowing reviews from my library computer. I don't listen to that album much anymore, but it gave me comfort when I drove home with the sunset in my rearview every night.

"Feeling yourself disintegrate..."