It’s easy to overlook how important it is to have a proper workspace that is separate from our living space. That fact is emphasized to me now that I am home all day. There’s definitely an emerging workplace trend towards “working from home” but I’ve never found that it works all that well for me. I think I need the mental discipline of getting out of the house, changing venue, and going to the place that is designated for work. When I’m at home, it seems like there’s always some distraction or other, plus there’s no face-to-face interaction and that’s really important. Call me old-fashioned if you want, but I believe for best productivity we’ll continue to need personal face time for at least the next four or five years, at which time the machines will have replaced us all.
Anyway, I live in a 900 square foot house, and I share it with a housemate. Two bedrooms, a living room, a dining room, a kitchen and a bath. Plus a cellar (not found in most Bay Area homes, but this place was built in 1920 when they still did that sort of thing) and a detached garage, which is the stuff of Valley legend. I used to walk right past the “HP Garage” on the way to work, where Hewlett-Packard started and Silicon Valley thus arguably began. Our garage, though less notable, has certainly never seen a car during our tenancy, as it is crammed full to the brim with projects. And rats. Oh yes, the rats. They don’t tell you that, but Precious Palo Alto is infested with Rodents of Unusual Size. From a rat’s perspective, it’s paradise: lots of mature fruit and nut trees, old buildings with lots of holes and gaps, large vegetated lots, mild weather. When working in the garage, you can hear the rats running around on the roof, in the walls, and especially in the hedge outside… I’ve even seen a live one a time or two, and I’ve killed about 20 of them with various trapping schemes, but it’s a losing battle. If they ever came in the house, I would declare jihad, but they’re pretty smart and after the initial carnage we’ve reached détente: we each mind our own business now and pretend the other party doesn’t exist. Anyway, in contrast to the house, the backyard is positively spacious at 1/3 acre. In this neighborhood, the land alone is “worth” $2.5 million or thereabouts, and if anyone bought the place, the current house would be immediately torn down so that something larger could go up. I grow fruits, veggies and rather large ham radio antennas back there, much to the delight (I’m sure) of our long-suffering but silent neighbors.
Wait, where was I? Oh right, office space. What I was trying to say was, space has historically been at a premium in the house. I built a loft bed so I could have a little desk underneath, but it was never all that comfortable and saw little use. My big break didn’t come until my roommate’s wife moved out. She even took the dining room table and chairs (eat your heart out, Hank Williams), leaving the former dining room ripe for colonization. And, in the absence of any countervailing non-bachelor force, the dining room became a den, complete with a 4K TV and, yes, my desk and my ham radio station to boot. And a fish tank, too, because why not.
In an effort to get out of the house, I met a friend for lunch downtown and pitched my startup idea. He’s interested. I think the idea has some modest potential and I want to kick it off. I know it’s crazy. I’m not even a week into my “vacation” and I’m already trying to figure out some new bourgeois capitalistic money-making scheme. It’s a sickness. I need to resist as long as possible and do nothing at all until it hurts.
All the same, I can tell I will for sure be stir crazy in short order. My roommate’s wife (a/k/a the Dining Room Liberation Front) works for a company called WeWork that rents individual desks in chic surroundings to freelancers, startups, e-drifters, cyber ne’er-do-wells, unicorn dreamers, millennials (but I repeat myself), and the cynically digitally funemployed (such as yours truly). I would seriously consider renting a desk there if they had any facilities around here. Sadly, they’re all up in the City, because that’s where the cool kids want to hang out and be seen. Riding up to San Francisco would entail at minimum two hours’ daily commute on the train, not to mention about $20 in train fares. So, I suppose I will continue to fester here in the dining room home office and watch the world go by.
I guess there’s always the library.
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