It seems that my destiny in librarianship may lie in a reference librarian/web development combo. Anyone in my family that reads this will understand the irony of the latter. For those that don't get the joke, allow me to explain.
My younger brother is known as the "brain child." He is a very smart and talented young man who has done extremely well academically, and we are all very proud of him (I hope to do as well in my current program as he has done with his schooling). Ever since high school--or possibly middle school, it's hard to remember--he has shown a strong interest in computers that developed a focus on programming. This has basically been his long-time hobby. He was the one that we all called whenever we had a question about, well, pretty much anything computer or technology related. My poor HTML skills were like the kitten to his jungle panther. And now it seems that I am following (albeit at a much slower pace and in one area rather than all) in his computer-skill footsteps. He has blazed the trail that I seem to find myself on since starting this web development class--something that even two or three years ago I would not have considered to be in my future. Now I seem to be doing what my brother was doing years ago and I could only see as a kind of magic then. I guess this merely illustrates the truism that we cannot predict where we will end up.
So since I've had a lot of fun in both my reference class (which was last semester) and my web development class, I think I'm going to concentrate the rest of my classes in these areas. And I finally found something that I don't like. The cataloging class that I'm also currently taking has merely illustrated to me that I do not want to pursue cataloging as part of my career. It's been very challenging, and while I have managed to do well academically (at least so far), I've struggled with a lot of the concepts and really have not felt the same joy as I have with reference and web stuff. Despite the difficulty, I am glad that I took it if for no other reason than I will have a better idea of source location when I'm on the reference desk (and it helped give me a clearer vision of what I want to do).
As I'm coming up on the halfway mark of my program (I will officially be halfway through upon completing my current classes), I've definitely come a long way. I certainly have a much better grasp of the profession and its many facets, and many of the issues that define and challenge what librarians and libraries do. I have a defined goal, not just "I want to be a librarian" but "I want to be a librarian that specializes in reference and web development (and perhaps in the public sector)." I hope to be taking two classes in the fall that will further this goal: JavaScript (because of both my personal inclination and the recommendation of my current web instructor) and an advanced reference class (which is being taught by the instructor I had and loved last semester).
Just a brief note that I know I'm overdue to post a recipe; one will be forthcoming by week's end (Scooter and I had chicken and dumplings earlier in the month when it was cold and rainy).
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