Justin is welcome at our house.

I used to know how to calculate square roots sans calculator. I used to know how to use a slide rule. I used to know a lot of things. Most of them are “used to know”s because my need to use these facts/techniques peaked shortly after I learned them – supplanted by more recent discoveries or more modern processes. However, I still know there is that other way and that historic fact. It is comforting to have fall backs.

Just 2 days ago my road-tripping son needed a place to spend the night when “plan A” fell through. I tried to contact a friend on his route, but the phone line was busy. Fall back: I sent her an e-mail. As it turns out, she has a dial-up connection and her phone was not just busy, it was out. She didn’t get my message until it was too late and Scott was on his own. But the point is that there was a plan B. In our headlong rush to library 2.0, are we going to leave behind the plan Bs of information retrieval? I have a hard time imagining no “just in case” collection, as Rick Anderson calls it. When the circulation system goes down, we don't like it, but we can do manual checkouts when patrons bring us the materials.

Another thing: what about our technical “footprint”? These days it is PC to worry about our effect on Gaia in the sense of living small, eating and buying locally, etc. Is it PC (or even OK) to disregard the environmental cost of producing all the computer hardware and software, of digging trenches to bury all the optical cables, of building and erecting all the transmission towers for wireless networks, etc. to enable us to jettison the “just in case” collection? Or even to begin to consider it as a just in case collection? It’s akin to the debate of cloth vs. disposable diapers. We cannot do without. Who is to decide?

Many years ago, as our family was packing for a vacation, my son asked if it was alright to include a particular item in his bag. When I asked why he thought he needed it, he said it was "for Justin. You know, Justin Case."