This morning I did a quick journal entry, had my coffee and oatmeal and headed downtown. I checked in with the Open Books staff, who were doing all of the volunteers for Lit Fest. I was a floater, and while other floaters were sent to the Operations trailer to be given jobs to do, I was told to wait because they could have one for me at the library. A little later I was told to go there and that I would be checking tickets for the author talks. There was no charge, but people had to register and get tickets to be sure they could get seats.
I was stationed at one set of doors of the main auditorium and another lady was at the other door. Library staff were also there telling people where to go and to have their tickets out, which almost everyone did. All we had to do was look to see that they had them. Each event had a different colored ticket, so it was easy to identify. I really don’t think they needed us. We weren’t allowed to go in and listen to the authors either. We had to stay at the door to be sure no one tried to sneak in without one. But, none of them had a full capacity crowd, so it would not have mattered and some people with tickets came in very late.
We were told lunches would be brought to us and had a choice of a few different sandwiches. I had already been given a voucher to get lunch at one of the restaurants on Dearborn and I did not remember to turn it in when they asked me what I wanted brought over. I could probably put on my Lit Fest shirt, go down tomorrow and use it, but I would feel dishonest doing that. I only volunteered to work one day. I may still go down to see what I did not get to today and listen to some authors, or poetry readings. But I would not want to use the lunch voucher if I was not working. Besides, I will eat at church.
I was able to go to the last author that spoke at the library, Sara Paretsky, author of Hardball. I had heard her name but was not familiar with her books. After hearing her interview, I will have to read them because she wrote about South Chicago, my neighborhood. One of my favorite new TV series Castle must have been based on her books too, because her main character is a female detective, as is the heroine in Castle. Castle is a mystery writer working with her for material for his novels.
IT'S NEVER TOO LATE! 