She’s Going To Grow Up Into A Real Treat

I work in a library. We had a patron who allowed her eight-year-old child to run roughshod and unsupervised all over our library. The girl left nasty, profanity-laden notes for my staff to find. We warned the mother multiple times that her daughter needed to remain by her side while in the library.

One day, one of my staff, who suffered a disfiguring injury to her hand some years ago, received a note from this child making fun of her hand. The girl also made some snarky comments to my employee’s face.

My employee handed me the note. I was so furious, I saw red. I confronted the mother and showed her the note.

Me: “You need to take your daughter and leave.”

I consulted with my trustees and we agreed to ban them both for a month.

The mother came back in and tried to argue with me.

Mother: “My daughter is just a baby! It isn’t right for a public library to ban us!”

Me: “It is totally unacceptable for your daughter to harass my staff with her comments and notes.”

The mother actually looked me in the eye and said:

Mother: “What my daughter did wasn’t harassment!”

Me: “You and I have very different ideas of what harassment is.”

She left and didn’t come back for a long time. I’ve barely seen them since.