This talk was given at the National Agricultural Library in December 2007 for a one-day symposium sponsored by PALINET.
The worries and frustrations expressed in it turned out to color my entire career as a librarian, as well as much of my later speaking and writing. If you think you recognize a lot of “Innkeeper of the Roach Motel” in this, you are not wrong.
My speaking has generally enabled me to express myself more bluntly—or, if you prefer, with less regard for my colleagues’ feelings—than my professional writing. In my head, that means my speaking has come a lot closer to my truth.