It is conference season!!!! Let the record reflect that I possess an Oprah-announcing-a-giveaway level of excitement about attending conferences. I LOVE THEM. This love started when I was a wee junior in college, learning to be an English teacher and I attended a YALSA conference (Young Adult Library Services Association). It was magical. There were BOOKS and BOOK LISTS and BOOK PARAPHERNALIA (bookmarks, so many bookmarks) and evvveryone was talking about books. What I’m saying is, it was a nerd convention and I was among my people.
Well, in the last two weeks of May, I attended three conferences. This means I had to be extremely friendly/social, make some peer-buddies (because I knew no one at 2/3 and I can’t not talk to someone), caffeinated enough to make sense when speaking to strangers (which is extremely caffeinated if I have to wake up at any hour pre-dawn), caffeinated enough to not want to fall asleep in any sessions (because that’s rude, no matter how boring the session is) AND, on occasion, I was required to present myself to non-peer-type-people with some degree of authority and professionalism (which is exhausting and painful if you have social anxiety!).
Three in two weeks was too many too soon. I. Am. Exhausted… and I’ve already had a week to recover.
There was a librarian conference with workshops for specific skills or ideas; Book Expo which is mostly book buzz and ARCs; and a writers’ conference.
It was fun to meet new people at two of the places, and to hang out with people I knew at the other, as we made mad dashes to grab all the cute promotional totes. Seriously, I came home with at least 6 tote bags.. And I was being choosy.
All I will say about the conference with the workshops is that it was a beautiful, blue-sky day on a college campus and I had a lively chat at lunch about censorship and culture shock between the North and South with people relatively new to the library community and people who have been members for 30 years. It was reaffirming that I could sit down with people I had never met before and find common ground (and create a common lifegoal–taking a vacation to operate a bookstore, WHICH APPARENTLY EXISTS !!!!–Mel, we gotta book (sorry, couldn’t resist) this, ASAP). Our lunch table bonded, y’all. It was a billion times better than a silent food-shoveling-adjacent-to-others.
Book Expo is a special kind of madness in an enormous exhibition hall. I like to just ‘wing it,’ or, more likely, glom on to someone who has researched what book stalls they want to go ahead of time. At the end of the day, I left with about 10-12 Advance Reader Copies and many lists of books that will be published in the next several months. Many were added to my Goodreads to-read shelf (cries a solitary tear, but they sounded so good so it had to be done). My most treasured ARC was Nick Offerman and Megan Mulally’s upcoming book they wrote together. The ARC I didn’t get but wish I had was a novel called Ohio. The author was signing books and had a giant line so I looked it up and it sounds interesting. But, NOT uplifting so I decided it was not worth a huge line 
The people at Book Expo were ruthless in their line forming/cutting. It was a bit grabby for my liking, but I made it through the day not entirely grumpy from the pushy people and my having woken up at 5:30am.
As for the writers…. Wow. It was a lot to take in. There was tons of information about maybe-possibly-trying-to-write-a-book-and-get-it-published. That was overwhelming, but tempered with sessions of varying merit about cool topics. My favorite session had HOMEWORK (we had to read two essays before we got there and one of them was Cheryl Strayed) and the teacher-lady kicked ass. What blew my mind the most was that none of the presenters the whole weekend rolled their eyes at anyone. Even when I thought a story idea sounded entirely ridiculous and un-marketable, the presenters were encouraging and treated the idea as if it were plausible. I shudder to think about the admissions entries for creative writing programs, so, good thing I’m just a blogger and not a writing teacher.
As much as I think I am an extrovert, I am really looking forward to a couple weeks where I don’t have to mingle with strangers, but instead kick back with my cat, a book and read.
Ps, if anyone is keeping track, I’m sorry I don’t own all the photos I post. Please don’t report me to the copyright militia.
The Angry Librarian 