Re: Time (marches on) Magazine

[Jeff Kirkpatrick <jeffkirk@SNI.NET>]

>Gary's ending quotes are quite to the point.  As he says,
>decision-makers may very well bypass librarians in the future in favor
>of that techie with the screw driver.  We need to reinvent ourselves to
>operate educationally and politically in the new decentralized
>information environment.  Carl Martz Yucaipa CA cmartz@eee.org
>
        If I might add a simple reminder, though?
        One of the driving forces which APPEARS to be endangering the
concept of libraries is the false expectation that this penultimate pyramid
scheme, otherwise known as Capitalism, can somehow make rich folks out of
us all, and that we should each somehow wish to be obscenely rich, even
while this planet and its disperate children are starved out, due to our
callous and foolish inattention to their simple gifts and needs.
        Routinely living beyond one's means--euphemistically "borrowing"
from one's own future--is an absurd, if currently common notion.  In cosmic
terms, though, this frenzy will not even show up as a blip as life moves
inexorably forward.
        The parasitic business which temporarily "thrives" at the expense
of its patrons and its employees may not endure.  Simply.  Its product is
not viable.  Nor the planet; nor the pseudo-government; nor the school
"administration."  The body which does not accommodate--with Reason--for
its own genuine future does not persist into the future.
        Conversely, the prospect of a library--if it is a library--is that
we elect to come together to sanely and responsibly share those naturally
finite and limited resources we have (to include our selves), both for
today and tomorrow; with essential respect for who we are, where we have
come from, and where we are headed; thus, without the insane notion that we
may somehow have and retain it all in a single moment, as well as in
perpetuity, without knowing and trusting to naturally share it on.
        Those who believe (or fear that) libraries are destined for
oblivion have forgotten what libraries are.  Libraries cannot possibly be
destroyed, so long as there is any desire to build and sustain community.
        Of course evolution is essential.  Hey!  Evolution is, of course,
essential.  But it should be worked with confidence and an air of joyous
expectation, rather than mourning, fear and dread.
        Reason begets libraries, regardless of their evolutionary form.
Only were Reason to be abandoned would libraries likewise cease.
        And failing Reason we children of the Earth would not be here,
communicating--sharing--now.
        Enjoy!

Jeff Kirkpatrick

*****
        It is of little relevance how much we trust others.  What is
essential is that we trust ourselves.  (Thereafter, who and what we trust
beyond ourselves becomes a simple matter.)

*
        I bid you welcome to our library--the library of our making.  For,
here we invite and are invited, in mutual trust and respect, to
share--thoughts, hopes, dreams; all the world, in fact, and more...
        ... because it is our choice, if not our need.

Jeffrey E. Kirkpatrick
Profession: Teacher/learner
Present Occupation: Records Manager (in Denver, CO)
e-mail address: jeffkirk@sni.net

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