“My 11 year old got lost and asked for help at a library. They told her she couldn’t call her mom from the phone and should use a payphone. She said she didn’t know how. They said they couldn’t help and she ended up crying alone on the street corner @torontolibrary”
That was my tweet on Friday afternoon, Nov. 29, shortly after I picked up my daughter from where she was standing out on the corner. A random woman waiting for the bus let my kid use her phone to call me. I didn’t think much of the tweet. I’ve had a small, low-key Twitter account (okay its “X” now) since 2009 which has stayed stable at about 1000 followers, and I mainly use it to comment on issues in Toronto or women in the construction industry. I’m an electrician and a part-time writer. I usually delete tweets if they start to go viral, but I use my account to support my side gig in writing.
But something about this simple description of what happened to my little family that afternoon touched people. I started getting more replies and comments then I could handle and before I knew it millions of people had seen it. The post is currently standing at over 16 million views. 99.9% of people have been supportive and understanding, but it’s the internet and when you get millions of views some takes will be unhinged.
But I think there’s a reason it resonated.
Everyone seems burned out from dealing with COVID-19 and now living in a “new normal” worse than the previous one. There’s been some kind of compassion fatigue lately. We are seeing more road rage, interpersonal and structural violence towards cyclists — even something as simple as less benches to sit on makes for a slightly more hostile society than we had before. People are scared of each other.
People are apparently scared even of 11-year-old girls asking to call their mom on a street corner, for some reason. She asked dozens of people before one person let her call me.
It also touches on people being weird about libraries. They can be magic, but libraries are also under pressure to be everything to everyone. They’re asked to fill all the gaps in the shrinking social safety net and be sophisticated palaces of literacy at the same time. Staff are trained to work on collections and helping patrons with research, not to be front-line social workers, de-escalating conflicts or attempting to secure shelter spots for people for the night. I know, I worked at the Oshawa Public Library for a year as a computer access intern. It felt a lot like a social work job but without the acknowledgment. Librarians also report increasing workplace violence, like many public-facing jobs.
What the difficulties in public spaces tell me is that much more support needs to be given to vulnerable community members. At a basic level, libraries should be the best face of the community. And a good community supports our young people.
People are also being weird right now about kids and parents — especially about moms. Never have the stakes been higher. Some people online asked why my kid doesn’t have a phone. But smartphones are evil and kids should never be on them!
For the record, she does own a basic flip phone, but she lost it that day in her room. I had a job interview. I left her money, my backup debit card and a piece of paper with emergency numbers on it. It was a PA Day that day (a Professional Activity Day, when there is no school), and my kid was at a day program which for some reason ended two hours earlier than it was supposed to. She decided she could get home herself. She was very close. Another kid in the program apparently walked outside the program location and down the street and sat sadly on a rock. Unfortunately, my kid took a wrong turn and ended up in an unfamiliar area.
People who don’t live downtown don’t know that urban kids pretty commonly walk around themselves quite a bit. Toronto’s public school board even issues tokens for middle school kids to take transit themselves, and many kids at downtown schools walk home themselves in little groups starting in grade four or five.
But even if we weren’t doing a more free-range urban parenting thing, kids do get lost, at all ages. It’s why the mall or Disneyland has desks and procedures for lost kids. And it’s why libraries need to be safe and supportive spaces for kids.
My kid saw a library and saw it as a lifeline. She has been taught, by myself and her auntie and her dad, that libraries are good spaces for kids. She attends activities in them with her little sister and goes there on quests to find a particular edition of a book.
But on this day, my kid went up to the counter at the library, trying not to cry, and asked if she could call her mom. The library worker told her that the phones were for customer use only. My kid asked for help again. The library worker told her that she could use a payphone outside, but my kid said she didn’t know how to use a payphone. The librarian told her they were closing.

The library worker admits she turned my kid away. She told someone that she didn’t seem to be in distress. It’s true that she was trying hard not to cry. She talked to a TV news person later and didn’t want to say she was crying, because it’s not cool to admit you were crying when you’re in grade six. But a lone kid asking to call their mom *is an emergency*.
My kid ended up going outside, where there are indeed some of the few remaining payphones. She tried to remember what we taught her about payphones, but every payphone is different now. This one said “insert card” so she tried to put in her debit card. She couldn’t figure it out. She started asking people for help, to use the payphone or to use their phone to call her mom. She asked perhaps a dozen people. They said they were busy. She says one person darkly muttered “teenagers” to her. Finally, one woman let her use her phone.
When she called me I was frantically trying to find her, and I was about five minutes away from calling the police. But when she got to use a phone she told me where she was and I told her to stay there. I was on my way. When I finally saw her, standing outside — it had just gotten dark — it was clear she was trying to keep it together but melted into tears when she saw me.
If the library worker had just let her call me, all of that could have been avoided and she would never have left in distress on that corner or crying in the public phone booth.
I’m told that in New York City (NYC) they have a formal safe space program regarding libraries and young people. We might need this. Children and youth are not like other members of the public. We all have a duty to protect and care for them. That includes supporting them through developing age-appropriate independence. But also any kid at any age can get lost and we should all be willing to help them.
Toronto Public Library sent me an email. They said “We sincerely apologize for the incident at our library branch where an 11-year-old child was denied access to a telephone. This is simply not okay, and it doesn’t align with our commitment to serving all community members, especially children, with care and compassion. We view this as a very important opportunity to review and reinforce our staff training protocols to make sure nothing like this happens again. Keeping our community safe and welcome is at the heart of what we do.”
Maybe the Toronto Public Library system needs to develop a formal program about safe spaces for young people, since the common-sense to help a young person asking for help seems to be lacking. We are in some ways a city similar to NYC and maybe in this we should look to their programs for guidance on how to help kids in a complex urban space.
I’m thankful my kid is safe. She is going to have her flip phone with her all the time now, especially on an independent trip. But anyone’s phone battery can die and we all, no matter what age, need to be able to access help when we need it.