It is many people’s dream to work from home. I am living that dream and I want to tell those people: it’s not 100 percent dreamy.
I left the office to work for myself more than two years ago so you’d think by now I’d have nailed the working-from-home thing. You’d be wrong.
In fact, I’m not even writing this column at home. I’m writing it in a café where I’ve begun to flee with my laptop whenever possible. My son is appalled by this. He thinks people who use computers in public are showing off.
When I first told him I was working in a café, he thought I was making coffee. This was preferable in his mind to what I was actually doing which was writing. Because only embarrassing show-offs do that.
To prove his point, a few days later he called me over to watch a scene from Family Guy where a couple of dudes are using their laptops at Starbucks. “I’m writing in public because I’M A WRITER,” announces one to nobody in particular in a voice dripping with self-importance, “working on MY LAPTOP and if nobody sees me writing then it doesn’t count.”
I took exception to this. After I stopped laughing.
There are many things about working from home that delight me. The dress code is one. I am never happier than when I can work in jeans a t-shirt and no make-up (oddly, I cannot write properly when wearing a dress. I have no idea why this is so let’s just file it under B for Bonkers).
The other gigantic benefit is seeing my children throughout the day although I will not for a moment pretend it’s possible to achieve anything other than high stress levels while trying to work with small kiddies under foot or under desk. I have help with them every workday.
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Oh, and I worked from home before I became a parent and have always had to go to a cafe sporadically. I can't work in the silence (if no toddler, the tv is on..I have seen every episode of the West Wing in the background at least 10 times) and sometimes when you are writing, you need some kind of human connection. (well, I do anyway)
I wonder if I should even post given the number of people who have already covered the same ground.
I love working from home but it just never ever ends. I managed at home til Eleanor was 13 months and then she started 2 days a week of child care (I have always worked full time, for myself. I took 4 days off when she was born). I love not getting dressed (I'm a sloth at the best of times) and I love being able to be here for those interminable 9 - 2 electricity meter 'appointments'.
I hate that there seems to be no definition to the beginning and end of work. I hate that I recently signed a work email 'love' because I had her on my lap and got distracted. I hated that at 18 months old, her first multiple word sentence was 'puter OFF mumma."