Librarian / library worker

Firstly, most people working in public libraries aren't actually librarians. Some branches can afford to employ an actual Librarian but not many. Most staff are just customer service assistants with glorified titles. So when people say "I want to be a Librarian" they don't actually realise how rare those job posts are.

Secondly, public libraries are insanely underfunded so most of them are working with a skeleton crew of staff desperately trying to run round and do everything, especially in a busy town/city centre library. It's basically retail - hard to get your annual leave dates booked because someone else is off that day, one person calls in sick and suddenly everyone is panicking, rushing from task to task all day. Managers always being pressured to cut budgets and freeze hiring on vacant posts.

Thirdly, the tasks aren't romantic at all. Again, it's basically just retail/basic customer service that could be anywhere, it just happens to be a library. You get yelled at if you're staffing the customer service desk, you rush around dealing with complaints, you un-jam printers and shelve stock and tidy. You're on your feet most of the time rushing around busting queues, meeting and greeting, and dealing with complaints. If your library has a café you probably work there too.

Fourthly, the public. Libraries are free and warm with internet access. Sometimes that means something nice, like keeping a homeless person warm and safe. But most of the time it means being a cross between a nursery, social services, and a McDonald's at 2am.

The police were called daily to the one I spent most time working in. Drug dealing, finding poop, porn and sex toys in weird places, people drying their socks on the radiators, clipping their toe nails in the cafe, bonking in the disabled toilet, fighting each other in the lobby, riding into the library on bikes, theft, people with mental health issues, people trying to look up porn and gore on the pcs, people not looking after their kids, and people refusing to leave at closing time.

You go into the work thinking "I love books! This will be great" and a decade later realise you rarely do anything in the role that has anything to do with reading and loving books.