Back to the Bronx

If you haven't quite figured out, I really enjoy heading up to the Bronx. I got the opportunity to go back on Wednesday.

Nick, my boss at NYPL, had been in contact with a man at the James J. Peters VA Medical Center. The contact told Nick he had several veterans who wanted to share their stories. Myself and a few other NYPL employees went to the VA yesterday to conduct those interviews.

The "great" part of this was we were suppose to be at the VA at 8 AM. A little bit early for me, especially since it takes about an hour to ride up to the Bronx. So I left bright and early at 6:30 AM from the hotel. I treated myself to a cup of red velvet hot chocolate and a muffin from the Coffee Bean next store before getting on a northbound subway train. I got up there and was once again reminded that the Bronx is HILLY.

Manhattan is pretty flat but that disappears in the Bronx. Got my workout in walking up some pretty long and steep hills.

Once I arrived at the VA, we set up and waited for our veterans. They slowly started to arrive and I ended up conducting two interviews. The first one was with a man who served in Vietnam. It was another fascinating story and he said a lot of things that really got me thinking. The message he wanted to get across was that not all of Vietnam was bad. The second veteran I interviewed was a woman. She was NYPL's first woman veteran interviewed for this project. She also told a fantastic story and I was glad I had the opportunity to record her.

Around 12:30, I headed back to the Mid-Manhattan branch. I checked in with Brigid and then talked to Dan Cohen, the founder of the Music and Memory program. We chatted about my plans to begin a collection in the NYPL and where we could find potential Alzheimer's patients. It was a good conversation. I'm headed up to the Bronx again Friday afternoon to speak to a group of teens. I hope they will band together with me and jump start this program.

I really do enjoy my internship at NYPL. It's a fantastic opportunity to work within the library in ways I've never done before. I'm seeing a whole new side of libraries and learning a lot.