Let me say upfront, I really enjoy working from home.
I am incredibly lucky to have found not just a company I believe in, but who has given me the opportunity to work with co-workers I love, all from the comfort of my kitchen table.
However, I miss my cubicle.
There, I said it.
I also miss chatting with co-workers, eating in the lunchroom and, gasp, wearing real shoes to work that usually pinch my toes and make me dread walking across the parking lot.
Sure, I message my current co-workers throughout the day, talk to them on the phone and even on Facebook.
But, at lunch, I’m at my kitchen table – alone.
If I have a funny story to tell it’s only to myself – alone.
If I want to listen to someone else’s funny story, it’s all online – I’m alone.
And the only distraction I have from the daily grind is monitoring the antics of my two toddler daughters who always seem to empty a bottle of something sticky all over the living table at least once a day. It was funny - the first time.
To be fair, there are perks to working alone. I never wear shoes. I can cook a yummy lunch rather than settle for the soggy sandwich in my lunch bag. I can cuddle with my messy, troublesome toddlers right after I’m done sopping up whatever they’ve destroyed.
But on days when the dog won’t stop barking, the toddlers have dumped now three bottles of sticky stuff all over the house, the handyman is dragging mud across the floor as he fixes a toilet and the phone won’t stop ringing, courtesy of the doctor’s office – I really miss my cubicle.
I miss being able to hide from the rest of the days’ requirements and simply concentrate on work, enveloped in the gray, plain blanket of a cubicle. The multi-tasking circus act I call working from home is exhausting.
I’m not sure I’ll ever be able to return to the 9 to 5 grind on fulltime basis. I have become, in essence, spoiled by the freedom of setting my own schedule at home.
However, there are days when the trappings of a cubicle never looked sweeter.