"You're Not Cool Anymore"

At the University of Illinois' Graduate School of Library and Information Science, you meet some pretty amazing people.  People who fight for intellectual freedom, academic integrity, and well, COMICS.

I have been lucky enough to have class with Carol Tilley three semesters in a row now.  Carol Tilley is a comics and youth services rock star.  She's just amazing.  She teaches classes on media literacy, graphic novels, cataloging, and youth services.  Not only does Carol share her stories of growing up down the street from a library, serving in a high school library, and her fight to declare comics safe for everyone, she also loves to keep it real.  (And, use Ryan Gosling Hey [Librarian] Girl memes in her lectures.)

At my most recent class with Carol, she reminded all of us in the room that we're not cool anymore.  No matter how hard we try, we'll never be cool enough for the kids we help and teach.  This made me laugh, cause she's so right.  I am not cool enough for the kids at Uni, and I know I'll never be cool enough for the kids I end up teaching...especially if it's in a high school.

I've been thinking about this statement a lot today, and not in a woe-is-me way but in a bemused way.  Yes, I've been thinking, and I've come up with this conclusion: I might not be cool enough, but I AM AWESOME.  I am totally awesome, because I believe in myself, I wear dresses with Brontosauruses and banned book tee-shirts, and I carry a TARDIS lunchbox.  I am awesome, because I drink way too many triple mochas and lattes, I cook awesome food, I love my kids and husband an insane amount, and I discuss YA books with so much enthusiasm that I sometimes scare kids.  (All this girl wanted was a recommendation for a follow up for David Levithan's Boy Meets Boy, and I literally skipped back to The Future of Us and Nick and Norah's Infinite Playlist and Will Grayson Will Grayson.  I'm pretty sure she wanted me to calm down.)

Yup, I might not be too cool, but I am awesome, and I cannot wait to share my awesome sauce brand of self with kids in my own library one day.  I just hope they forage through my old exterior and quirks to find out how awesome I really am.  ;)