Barbara Lawlor, Nederland.  Dara Hannah Fayre Fanny Elektra Isabel Waldorf seems like an unusually long name, but not so much once you meet the person who usually responds to Elektra Greer, the new Nederland Community Library director. Last Tuesday, August 14, her first day on the job, a hot day for the mountains, Elektra took off her shoes and waded into the frigid stream that burbles along the library banks.

The cold felt good on the steamy day and Elektra was happy to have 12-year-old Asher Hughes join her for a cool down.

As much as she loves reading, Elektra also enjoys doing things outdoors and with the kids that visit her home away from home, the local library.

Elektra’s father is a writer and her family has a long history of storytelling.

He is also a World Bank economist/anthropologist who has traveled to Africa, South East Lesotho the African kingdom during apartheid. Both parents advised Elektra not to be afraid to live life. Her mother made sure the family didn’t live a colonial life.

With two older brothers at her side, the family was in Rwanda and active against genocide. Elektra was born in Washington, D.C. and the family’s life was a commute to upstate New York where she attended school.

“At first it was heartbreaking. I had an Afrikaner accent, wore bangles and even though I was excited to attend high school in America, it was hard to fit in. I was rejected, not a part of the popular groups. And then I discovered the high school newspaper and began to write a lot. I also read a lot and developed an anxiety that went along with not having a book in progress.”

When Elektra was young in Africa, her dream was to become a bush pilot, to fly to remote areas with non-profit agencies. Her other dream was to become prolific in writing romance novels. When she was 13 she considered pursuing phlebotomy but ended up studying arts and science, English and French at the University of Virginia to learn practical stuff. She failed phlebotomy.

At one point in her life, she drove through Colorado on a KOR motorcycle and said when she came to Nederland, “I swooned for the town.”

She came to visit Ned twice in 20 years before she moved here, enjoying the magical energy of the beauty and the people it attracts. She describes it as drenched in “Zen, zingy and zealous.”

When her husband took a job that led the couple to Nederland, her quest was to become employed by the Blue Owl Bookshop, to make and eat fudge. Six months ago, she was hired as the Longmont Public Library director and discovered she loved the work but wanted to do it in a smaller community. When she saw the opening at the Nederland at NCL, she jumped at the opportunity.

Now, her body, as well as her spirit and heart are in the same location.

“I have received an even warmer welcome that I ever imagined,” she says. “The children here are different than others. They are more experiential, more ethereal and I love story time being down on the floor cross legged with them.”

Elektra says that after her first day at NCL she was surprised that she didn’t want to drive home, away from the mountains, and has promised herself she will move here in six months.

Now that she is settling in, Elektra says she is eager to hear what library patrons have on their reading desire list and to share her love of books with her new community.