Got yelled at by a librarian for eating chips in the quiet zone at a library in Portland last month

I was sitting in the quiet study area at the Multnomah County Library downtown, trying to finish a book for my book club meeting the next day. I had a bag of barbecue chips I snuck in because I was starving after dropping my kids off at school. I guess I was crunching louder than I thought because an older librarian came up and whisper-shouted at me to take it outside. She said the sound was distracting everyone on her floor. I was so embarrassed I just grabbed my stuff and left, but now I only eat snacks in the loud sections of any library. Has anyone else gotten schooled by a librarian for a dumb mistake like that?

2 comments

2 Comments

the_brian14d ago

Yeah this whole thing reminds me of how we're all just supposed to know these unspoken rules that nobody actually tells you about. Like when you walk into a library you're expected to just magically understand the difference between quiet zones and talking zones and snack zones and whatever. I remember when I first moved to Portland I walked into that same library and started talking on my phone in what I thought was a regular area and this guy gave me the dirtiest look like I had committed a crime. The thing is we're all running around trying to get stuff done and eating a bag of chips or taking a phone call shouldn't be this huge ordeal. But librarians have been doing this job for years and they've seen it all so they've got this whole system in their head that nobody else knows about until you break one of the rules. It's kind of like how every grocery store has a different unspoken policy about which line you're supposed to stand in or which self checkout is actually open. We're all just guessing and hoping we don't get yelled at.

ericcraig14d ago

Read this thing about how libraries are basically the last place with actual social contracts. @the_brian nailed it.