Old Librarian, New Tricks

By Derek Fisher

At 63, Marie Albertson packed up her things, pointed herself south and left her home of 40 years. At her destination, a new house awaited, but the rest was to be determined: There was no job lined up and no real plan.

“Can you imagine anything so dumb?!” Albertson asks rhetorically of the move.

In retrospect, it was not at all dumb; it simply was the first in a long series of adventures for the Carmel resident and author.

Albertson, now 80, recently penned a book, Old Librarians Never Die, They Jump Out of Airplanes. It is equal parts motivational tool, travelogue and autobiography and tells an amazing woman’s equally amazing story.

“I wrote it to encourage women to do adventurous things in their later lives,” Albertson said. “I wanted to tell women to not just grow old and retire – do the things you want to do.”

Unequivocally, Albertson has done just that.

An Illinois native, she was a homemaker and mother to four in Plymouth, Ind. Albertson enrolled in college at 47, attained a master’s degree at 60 and made that bold move to Hamilton County shortly thereafter.

A stint at the Indiana State Library followed, and during seven years as a librarian, a passion for books and travel was born.

“I read about so many places,” said Albertson. “At 70, I retired and declared I was going to visit all seven continents.”

She succeeded. Albertson has walked on the Great Wall of China, swam with sea lions in the Galapagos, traversed the Sahara, pub-hopped in Ireland, tree-surfed in Australia and so much more.

Authoring a book on those exploits, and their underlying motivations, was a natural step.

“It was an adventure in itself,” Albertson said of the writing process. “I was in a program where you write every morning, not worrying about punctuation or grammar – you just put down thoughts. I had so much saved up from my travels, it wasn’t hard.”

As incredible as those travels are – she’s presently in the midst of planning a safari – the idea there is time left is paramount in the book.

“I’ve been late in life at everything,” said Albertson. “I wanted to convey you’re never too old and it’s never too late. I live by three c’s: curiosity, challenge and change. Find something you don’t know, and dig into it. Find a challenge, and meet it.”

Albertson has yet to duck a challenge.