It has been quite a while since I’ve posted here, but there is a good reason: in September 2018 I started graduate school in pursuit of my second master’s degree, and since then I have been trying to master the balance of full-time job, part-time graduate school, and living my life to its fullest.

Happily, I survived my first year of school, and on Tuesday I will be beginning my second year of graduate school. As these things tend to go, I’m hopeful that my second year will be less stressful and more manageable (one can hope, right?), the theory being that after surviving one full year’s cycle, then I’ll have the skills to better anticipate challenges and scheduling conflicts.  Stay tuned to see if that theory proves correct…  🙂

It’s been interesting going back to school as a middle-aged, mid-career adult, especially since most of my classmates are in their 20’s and 30’s and are new to the field.  I’m attending Simmons University as an online-only student, and I am working towards a Master’s in Library and Information Science.  As the title of this post suggests, I am about to reach the fourteenth anniversary at my job as the head children’s librarian in a public library, so some of what I am learning in school is not new to me.  The Simmons program is quite challenging, though, and I am being exposed to many new ideas, theories, and practical concepts, which is making this degree more than worth the time and energy (and money) that I’m spending on it.

For the fall semester, I am taking my last required core class, Technology for Information Professionals, which is a little daunting but also very exciting.  I’ve heard rumors that the final project for the class is to build a personal website from scratch, which definitely intrigues me.  And given that this class focuses on technology of all kinds, this seemed like a particularly good moment for me to resurrect my blog.  I’m going to try to post at least once a week, perhaps more frequently, and to include posts about what I’m doing/learning in school and also posts about what is going on at the wonderful library where I work.  And, of course, there will be posts about cats…  😉