Moving upstairs

With any move, there are details you have to figure out.

Such as where the paper towels are (above the counter, instead of under the sink).

And now, since I’m now around other people and walls are thin, whether I’d have to wear headphones when I listen to music (so far, no).

And since I have this weird thing about hitting the top step with my right foot, how I have to hit the first step in order for that to happen. (Also with my right foot.)

When there’s enough empty space in the office that I was trying to make plans for what to do with it — my idea for a pickleball court went exactly nowhere — it’s time to move.

And so we did, to a smaller space upstairs. It’s a nice spot; our facilities guys did a really good job putting everything together.

I was on vacation for the actual move last week, but went back on Monday to find the two boxes I had packed sitting on my new desk with my new chair.

I don’t have any chairs to meet with people, and I didn’t get one thing I had asked for, but I have no real complaints.

There was one adjustment we knew we would have to make. We get a delivery every Thursday and Friday, which gets left behind the back door of our old office. Before, we could just take the cart outside and bring it in, but now we just use the elevator.

Backbreaking stuff, as you can see.

It was a harder job to move our archives, since there was a lot of stuff to move and the big boss in the office had to find space that didn’t exist.

I wasn’t involved in moving them out — that vacation again — but spent about four hours yesterday helping, including figuring out a system that would make the whole thing less confusing fore everyone. I think it mostly worked.

All the time, it’s looking more and more like people actually work there.

My office is on the side of the building, so I have a window.

I actually didn’t care. We’re in an office park, so while it’s not exactly my wife’s and my HVACs of the World Tour from when we travel (got it again in New York), it’s not like I have a view of the Rockies or Santa Monica Pier.

So I had the shades pulled to keep glare off my screen. But then came word that the window-washers would be coming, and they wanted us to keep the shades open.

“Fine” … but then something amazing happened. I pulled the shades, the sun came in and everything seemed more pleasant. I guess what they say about natural light is true.

I still have a bit to learn, though. After getting through an online queue that started at more than 2,000 people to order tickets to Sara Bareilles’ Boston concert in October, I did a little happy dance in my office.

What I haven’t mentioned yet … my window is directly over the walkway into the building. Anyone coming in could have seen me, and me dancing is something no one wants to see.

Fortunately, I don’t think anyone was.

Getting caught up after vacation and working on the archives yesterday meant I didn’t get a chance to fully move into my new office until today.

I basically only used what I needed, although I was happy to arrange my desk so I could sit facing the door. I couldn’t in my old office, and even though I have great peripheral vision, people coming to my door still scared the crap out of me.

Not that I had a lot to move — mostly office supplies, and my only personal items are three pictures of me with my wife, a coffee mug from The Newseum and a Yankees poster that a former co-worker gave me when her mother couldn’t find a taker at a library book sale.

Sometimes — OK, this has pretty much been the only time — being a Yankees fan in Massachusetts does have its advantages.

But I realized something as I was starting to unpack.

This office is truly … mine.

In my old office, I moved into the space the last guy had left. There was a bookshelf I had no use for, a banner that meant nothing to me but I couldn’t just get rid of and various flotsam and jetsam that collects over time.

There was also a refrigerator that led to a story they’ll be telling about me 20 years from now. As it turns out, if you unplug the mini-fridge with the thought of getting rid of it without noticing the frozen peas, and the work at home the next day, the combination of the smell, the door being closed and the lights being off will have your coworkers thinking you died under the desk.

Who knew?

But everything in the office now is there because I want it to be.

Just in case, though, I have a pair of headphones in my computer bag.

I’m actually around other people now, and the walls are thin.

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