Last month for our homeschooler program, we shared some Native American stories and one of the stories I told was Coyote's Crying Song from the book Twenty Tellable Tales by Margaret Read MacDonald.
Now, when I was telling this story, I had to pretend to fall down. Ideally, I would not trip over my own feet and actually fall down, but, well, ideally librarians would pull in six-figure salaries and we all know that's mostly not happening. So the first time I pretended to fall down, I actually fell down and skinned my knee on the carpet. Um, ow.
That was the first impact. :)
But the greater impact came today at this month's homeschooler program. After the program, a mom brought her two 5-year-old boys up to me and they told me how much they enjoyed the "wolf singing the song" from last month. I was so happy to hear that the story had stuck with them and they had enjoyed it enough to remember it a month later.
Librarians, we have an impact on the kids we serve. Maybe a small impact sometimes, but lots of times it's a big, huge impact (just ask published authors if they went to the library as a kid and more often than not you'll get a happy earful, I'd bet).
Good for you for doing what you do.
Good for you for reading stories, playing video games with teens, providing a safe place to be and to learn, and spreading a love of literacy throughout your community.
What you do is important.
Good for you.
Good for us.