The Green Kangaroo

04/20/06

Why a Green Kangaroo?

Filed under: Associations, ALA, 2.0 — mghikas @ 04:27:37 pm

Some years ago someone here gave me a copy of "The One in the Middle is a Green Kangaroo," by Judy Blume. It's a story about a middle child (I'm not) who played a green kangaroo in a school play. The book has long since been passed along to someone else, but it gave me a way to think about my place in the world -- at least my professional world.

I am the one in the middle -- surrounded by executive directors and directors, one foot in the library world and one in the association world, at the crowded and often noisy intersection of very diverse flows of information and ideas. Never boring. Often challenging. Complex. Simple. Surprising. It all adds up to a "green kangaroo."

"Middleness" has an interesting, slightly amorphous quality. Sometimes it means being "extra hands"; sometimes it means taking charge; sometimes it means connecting and getting out of the way. Sometimes it's easier if it's not too defined.

You plant yourself in the middle of the intersection and you see lots of paths leading away. Once you follow enough of them, you find that they do cross and re-cross. Threads from an association executives' list discussion about "community" are relevant to "library 2.0." Discussions of ICT skills in the education world are relevant to instruction in a library or to web design.

One of the first indications of converging interests is the reading list. Often the same book recommendations come from people who would surely see themselves in very different contexts. Book recommendations show the commonality in that diversity.

As I've explored the "biblioblogosphere," I've been struck by several things. First has been the vitality and generosity of the professional exchange taking place. I have shamelessly grabbed references to other blogs and web sites, to interesting papers and new books to read. Second has been the reflectiveness of many posts -- the thoughtful consideration of context, of related issues and concerns, of evaluation. Finally, there is the personal voice -- with revelations of frustration, happiness, anger, optimism.

Now, this last one is difficult for me. My world has largely been one where "transparency" refers to openness about budgets, processes, goals. It isn't that those things aren't important to this new view of transparency -- just that they're not sufficient. Listening to Michael and Jenny and Meredith and others, it becomes clear that transparency also means letting personal "authenticity" show through. When you've spent a lot of hours "ghosting" carefully correct letters or compiling factual "no-personal-opinions-here" reports, that's hard. Still, it seems important -- and may be fun.

So, I'll set the "green roo" down in the middle of this intersection as a reporter, perhaps as an instigator, a sharer of stories, and, with luck, a collaborator. Come join me here in this intersection.

Comments, Pingbacks

  1. YAY! Welcome to the library blogosphere, Mary! Looking forward to reading more from you!

    Comment by Meredith [Visitor] · http://meredith.wolfwater.com/wordpress/ — 04/20/06 @ 17:11

  2. Congratulations on the launch. I always knew that you were one of "us."

    Comment by Michael Golrick [Visitor] · http://michaelgolrick.blogspot..com — 04/20/06 @ 17:30

  3. Welcome mary. great first post!

    Comment by Michael Stephens [Visitor] · http://www.tametheweb.com — 04/20/06 @ 19:18

  4. Welcome! I look forward to your posts. I enjoyed this first posting.

    Comment by Bill Drew [Visitor] · http://babyboomerlibrarian.blogspot.com/ — 04/21/06 @ 08:55

  5. Welcome! And what a wonderful name for reaching out to the growing world of bloggers and blog readers from school libraries!

    Comment by Christopher Harris [Visitor] · http://schoolof.info/infomancy — 04/21/06 @ 11:14

  6. Welcome! What a great post to start a blog! I'm looking forward to reading more.

    Comment by Ahniwa Ferrari [Visitor] · http://exlibrius.org — 04/21/06 @ 16:54

  7. Ha! I wondered if that was the book you were referring to. I can't believe I got the reference. ^_^ Looking forward to your posts!

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  9. The liminal space is always the most interesting ;) Congrats on your new blog, Mary!

    Comment by edh [Visitor] — 05/02/06 @ 22:06

  10. Welcome 'green roo'! Looking forward to hearing your ideas and reading your posts. Eclectic is good. The ability to look in and look out, to stand on the edge of the paradigm can be very useful.

    Comment by Darlene Fichter [Visitor] · http://library.usask.ca/~fichter/ — 05/03/06 @ 02:44

  11. Mary, this is a wonderful first post. As a soon to be graduate in LIS (Saturday!) who is very interested in all things info literacy and two point oh, I look forward to you r future discussions.

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