So I started a new job and I’m really excited about what I’m doing. However, thanks to the joys of COVID, I wanted to actually leave home, go to the office, and have a desk. Which means I’m the only person on this side of the floor… the tumbleweeds are rolling by.
As software designers would say, “This is not a bug, this is a feature.” When the new boss was letting me know about this situation ahead of time, I thought, “Great!” I actually work better in isolation. That is what appealed to me about the work-from-home situation. The wife and kids would go out for the day and the house would be all mine. All… mine! (insert evil laugh here)
Even having a desk in the bedroom from where to work, and being able to shut the door, and playing my music and/or radio, I couldn’t get over the fact that someone else was in the house with me. Kids would step in to give me a hug every so often. The wife would engage me with some news item when I came down for a snack. It disrupted my day in a way that being in an office never did. There, the presence of others was expected; at home, it was unwanted.
Plus you had the problem that you never went home after work; you were already there. I could bore you with the facts that you already know, since my working-from-home was no longer the exception, but the rule. There was no transition from being off-work to on. So despite having a great job working from home, it was driving me crazy. Having a sick day was pointless; a vacation was similar… unless you were leaving the house. Instead of resenting my co-workers – who I rarely saw – I resented my wife, just for being there.
So I figured the solution was to get a desk again–away from the house. I couldn’t afford to buy an office space, the shed wasn’t going to work as a “fortress of solitude” (because I live in Arizona, and an unheated / uncooled shed was simply not an option for five months out of the year), so a new job was the best solution… and it’s a great position.
Now what’s weird to me is that this is the first time in nine years that I’ve had a desk to go to in the same metro area. I had a desk when I was a traveling consultant at the location they asked me to fly to, but it was always a temp spot. It wasn’t MINE. Now I get the added weirdness of being the only one here. However, I think that’s gonna be a good transition for me. I had the “fortress of solitude,” I lost it, and now I’m back there again. By the time people actually have to come back to their desk, I’ll be comfortable.
Of course, I could be deluding myself–who knows? What do you think? Is this is a viable solution to my home woes, or am I simply running away and avoiding the relationship work with my family? Let me know in the comments below! Then you can see what I do with my books. However, if you’re not that interested in my writing, why not download my stories for free? You’ll be glad you did.
Albigensia Press 
I work in a huge retail/grocery store (no not walmart xD) so I worked through the entire pandemic. Who knew stocking the truck overnight in Grocery was an essential job. 😛 It was the only ‘normalish’ part of my life and continues to be during these weird times. What is even better is we are closed from 12pm-6 am since the pandemic begun, so no longer being 24 hours and being closed for 6 hours of my shift has been a really big plus. No annoying drunks or I mean customers harassing you at weird hours of the night like 2 am etc when you are just trying to get the job done and get out of there with little over time. 😛
Glad to hear you will be going back to work. I think more people need to get back into the swing of things, we have no one applying at our work because our state prolonged the unemployment benefits. As more people get vaccinated which it will happen things will go back to normal and people will actually have to go back to work. There is a lot of bitterness of me working through this entire pandemic as I am on the autism spectrum, a huge germophobe, my battles with anxiety through this entire thing and people be like ‘oh I am anxious, I can’t go to work.’ as much as I get it our government is creating a more lazy society than we were before. Yet people seem to be having no problem with going out and partying, to bars etc…just can’t make it to work. Like I get it, but I think we need to slowly be getting back to normal with following the same safety protocols we have since the beginning.