Nonfiction Book Reviews

About six weeks back or so, I had a patron come up to the front counter and ask me, “So, where is your daughter at tonight?”

“I’m sorry?” I said, flummoxed.  I have no children.

“The girl over at reference.  She’s your daughter, isn’t she?  Short dark brown hair…” he prompted me.

“Ann?” I said.  “Big smile, beautiful, petite?”

“Yeah, that’s her!  You guys look alike.  Aren’t you mother and daughter?”

I stared at him, bug-eyed.  Ann was all of 26.5 years old.  I’m 27.  That would have required me to get pregnant while still in the womb, and then give birth while only 6 months old myself.  Believe me, if that was my life story, I would be doing something a whole lot more wild and interesting than working at the local public library; something like living through numerous science lab experiments to see how it all happened.  Heck, I would at least be gracing the front pages of The Star (along with the obligatory stories of Elvis being spotted at the local supermarket, of course).

I must break from the story for a moment to give you some insight into this patron.  We call him The Tie-Dye Man, and we weren’t exactly being creative when we came up with the name.  He wears tie-dye clothing Every. Single. Day.  I’m not talking your standard tie-dye shirt - he also wears tie-dye pants, tie-dye socks, and to top it all off, he even paints his fingernails different colors - one finger will be blue, another purple, another green, and so on.

He is…eye-catching.  The wild clashing colors ensure that you would notice him 200 yards off.  He’s one of our more memorable patrons at the library, to put it nicely.

Trying to be gracious, I finally swallowed my shock, put on my best customer service face, and told him, “Ann is pretty close to my age, so no, she’s not my daughter, although she is very pretty, so I take it as a compliment that you think I look like her.” I smile evenly and turn to put something away.

So what does he do?  He then has the gall to ask me out!!!!  After insulting me and thinking that I’m old enough to be a 26.5 year old’s mother, he wants to go on a date with me?!

He is a crazy man.  That’s all there is to it.  The tie-dye clothing is just an outer symptom of an inner insanity (big shock there).

I laughed it off and said something about my husband probably not taking that too well, and walked away.  Inwardly, I was torn between laughing and crying.  Am I really aging that badly?  I haven’t even hit 30 yet, and this crazy guy is causing to me have a midlife crisis.

So of course the next day, I had to tell Ann all about the incident.  We’ve taken to calling each other mother and daughter, and it’s become a nice inside joke between us.

Well tonight, my “daughter” told me that she had a run-in with the patron herself.  Yesterday, he was walking towards her, and she saw him out of the corner of her eye.  “No eye contact!” she told herself.  “Just keep walking.” Unfortunately, it didn’t work.

“Excuse, I have a question,” said The Tie-Dye Man.

“Yes, how can I help you?” Ann asked in her most professional, I-am-a-librarian-on-librarian-business-only-don’t-you-dare-ask-me-out voice.

“Are you over 21?” he asked.  Feeling nice that day, she actually answered him instead of telling him she won’t discuss personal matters with him (a nice way of saying “buzz off.”)

“Yes, I am,” she said.

“Oh, well, I was wondering if you wanted to go out with me after work tonight for some drinks.”

When Ann told me this, I burst into laughter.  “First he asks out the ‘mother’ then he asks out the ‘daughter’!  What is he thinking?!”

Ann kindly told him that her boyfriend wouldn’t appreciate that, and turned the offer down.

This caused me to wonder: Do patrons know how much we laugh at them behind their backs?  Not all the time and not at all of them, but certainly the crazy ones.  And for the size of town that I live in, you wouldn’t think there’d be that many crazy people around, but alas, there are certainly more than enough some days.

Speaking of the crazy people, I shall have to tell you about the lady who talks to stuffed animals and makes us talk to them too.  Another post for another day…

Hava

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