Saying Good-Bye to My Office

This morning my boss called everyone together for an impromptu staff meeting to tell us that our office remodeling has reached the point when the furniture can be moved back in and installed. For some reason, unknown by me, he said that all needed to be done today, and as a gesture of...gratitude? apology? something...everyone who is involved with the furniture installation gets a paid day off tomorrow.

This is great news!! ...for everyone except my area. Instead of having the day off, we will come in tomorrow and pack up all of our stuff so that on Monday, we can move out of our offices. Then it'll be back to me sitting amongst the masses, being a captive audience to anything my coworkers feel like sharing, from detailed recounts of their gallbladder surgery to complaining about things they don't understand at all to the smell of that nasty potato salad someone keeps insisting on bringing for lunch. No more shutting my door when I need a moment of solace or simply need to hear what the person on the phone is saying to me. No more privacy for lunch/nap time. No more room for people to come visit me. No more credibility to patrons who see me come out of my office and automatically believe I know what I'm talking about.

I feel like I sort of blossomed while I've been here. I did a major overhaul of our website, completely redesigned some of our forms, took two computer classes, and created a new database for the office. Some of you may be tempted to argue that all this could have been done in my own office or not, but I don't think so. I've already covered the issue of privacy and having fewer distractions, but being here has also made me feel like I matter as an employee. And that's something I haven't felt in a long, long time.