The true triumph of reason is that it enables us to get along with those who do not possess it. So said Voltaire, and so I have liked to think for many a year. But to a desolate soul who has been subjected for hours to the continuous whining drills and the stupendous crashings that are the leitmotif of construction work, reason quickly gives way to a kind of death-drive retreat from cacophonous reality. We all become deranged, dispossessed, and a little desperate.
When you approach the foyer of my library (the Neil John Maclean Health Sciences Library) you immediately see the “walled garden” effect that the newly erected hoardings make. Thanks to the recent largesse of the federal government, we are one of many quickly-launched funded projects that are raising dust and breeding migraines all over Canada. During Phase I of our renovation, which will last two months, the library’s main floor will be a frantic scenario that makes the mad scene in Lucia di Lammermoor look tame. Phase II and III will continue during the later spring and summer, leaving no corner of the library untouched and no mind unravelled.
Workers have spent most of the past week putting up hoardings to contain the dust and commotion of construction (but not the noise, unfortunately). The north, east and west areas of the main floor have disappeared. Gone are the former Circulation Desk, staff offices, our boardroom, and most regrettably, the lunch room and toilets. Both circulation staff and librarians compete for breathing space at the reorganized Information Desk.
The rest of the staff are a crowded, oxygen-starved Ellenbogengesellschaft in the adjoining computer labs, which have been repurposed for the duration of construction. Some liaison librarians like myself have been able to find temporary shelter with their respective faculties.
Having escaped the great flood of 1997, when my staff and I had to move an entire library in plastic tubs from the basement to the (thankfully) still empty fourth floor of the St. Boniface Research Centre in Winnipeg, I can be philosophical about the current disruptions. And as I work yet another dreary shift at an Information Desk surrounded by tool-carrying banshees, I will try to live up to Voltaire’s maxim, even as I shout out complex directions to the toilets over a tumultuous roar that would never respond to a shush or a shaken finger.
Endless blather about health care coverage. But why aren’t we talking about dental care reform?