Welcome to My Living Room

After a recent Zoom call, it occurred to me that all the attendees were guests in my office, well actually, my living room.

The call started off like any other call, but took an unexpected turn into a situation that would not have happened in an office setting, much less my living room. I stayed on hoping that something would change, but it took a long time to return to a semi-normal state.

This wasn’t in the guides for remote work. I had pants on and made sure that the background was interesting for others, but somehow something else crept into my safe space.

It caused an immediate halt to my productivity for the day and made me question whether this was the workplace culture that I wanted to be a part of. I spent most of my day away from the computer thinking about how I would respond to what had happened. I took a long lunch, played on my phone in another room and basically avoided the living room as much as possible.

The next morning, I woke up an hour earlier than normal in a slight panic. I had another Zoom call first thing in my day and I was afraid of what might happen. Through the anxiety, I finally forced myself to log on to the call about a minute late. Things seemed to be normal again and I had a semi-productive day even though the memory still hung around.

I am sitting in the same chair at the same desk on the same computer in the same room typing this right now and I wonder in 5 or 10 years when I walk in this room, will I think about that call?

Going from an in-office setting to working remotely, has changed the dynamic of how we interact. It has changed how we will think of these interactions in the future and I have given myself permission to leave calls or any situation that makes me uncomfortable going forward.

This is my living room and I love having the opportunity and ability to work from it during these times, but this is MY living room and you are welcome to hang out as long as you remain respectful to everyone else here.