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Home Office

May 5, 2013 //  by Terra Osterling

Over the twelve years that we have lived in our house, my home office has at one time or another occupied three out of four bedrooms. For years I had one front bedroom to myself for books, computer, and casual writing. Then my husband and I decided to share a home office and shuffle the guest room to my prior space. Then, last fall, when my husband’s job led him to start working from home more often, I moved into my current (and final) home office. This is where I write for a living.

My new office. Wonky furniture placement and air-seeping windows are good problems to have.
My office.

At the back of the house, this room-of-windows overlooks our backyard – a mature pine tree and garden are the scene of entertaining squirrel and bird activity. This is better than facing the street and the traffic of Garbage Day three times a week (due to three pickup companies).

But facing the backyard presents its own challenges, as does having a home office in general.

Fauna

My two closest “co-workers” are my dog and cat. My cat Elsa is like that co-worker whose sole function is to annoy. Only consistent “removal” has convinced her to stay off of my lap/desk/keyboard/mouse while I am working. And her mixed howl-meow coming from other parts of the house usually signals that she will soon be barfing, unless I can call out to her and talk her out of it. This is especially great when I’m on the telephone with a client.

Which brings us to my dog, Valentina, who 99% of the time is asleep somewhere. Unless she is awake and suddenly decided that a treat/her dinner/going outside is a life or death matter. Cue the whining.

“Is that your baby?” “Um, no, that’s my dog.” “Is she okay…?”

Doggie whines, though, are preferred over screeching squirrel disagreements three feet outside my window. Any day.

Machine

Before I transitioned to full time freelance, I worked in an office park, a cubicle farm, an art deco downtown office building, and even in a little converted rural cottage. All of these places were climate controlled and strictly business surroundings.

Street traffic noises might waft up several floors, but in none of those settings did I contend with daily lawnmowers, weed-whackers, leaf blowers, snowplows or the whine of child-sized motorized vehicles.

It’s true that this is only an issue now that I can open the windows – and there in itself is little cause for complaint. Right now I hear the gentle rustle of pine branches-on-breeze and the chirps of several species of birds.

Machines are white-noise distractions that I can tune out or camouflage with music. But there are a few made-made sounds that don’t blend well with writing.

Man

Moving my home office to the back corner of the house means my windows overlook the backyards of two neighbors. In a neighborhood of city lot-sized yards, and houses separated by only 10-15 feet, we are lucky that these neighbors are *very good neighbors.*

Really, they are. So good, that I can gauge the time of day by their activities.

Two houses over lives really great neighbors and their boys, one son a late-night-employed twenty-something. He gets up just before lunchtime, takes their dogs out back, then runs through his morning workout of bouncing a tennis ball against their garage door.

Plunk.

Plunk.

Plunk. (Must be about 11:30.)

Plunk….

Immediately next door are three elementary school-aged siblings who are really fairly quiet. Release from the school bus at the end of the school day, however, is a time for celebration, and sometimes the resumption of breakfast-time squabbles. I get it, I remember my own after school elation, and then I silently note to myself that it must be about 3 o’clock.

In My Natural State

Rather than running outside and demanding quiet while disguised as the local wild-haired writer/recluse, I remember that I am getting to do exactly what I want to do – what I’ve always wanted to do – and how I want to do it.

In a very lucid way I love the screeching squirrels, shrill weed whackers and tennis ball plunks.

These are the sounds of my home office, and where I’m supposed to be, in this writing life.

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Category: Business of Freelance Writing, How I got "here", Old jobs, WritingTag: Change my life, Home Office, White noise, Working from home

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Comments

  1. Laurel Fuller

    May 7, 2013 at 8:23 AM

    I love thinking of you in this setting Terra! I too have a neighbor I could set my clock by although by going to an office I miss out on lots of cues. I hope some of your inspiration is back and you’re not at such a low point. You have amazing talent and skill and it WILL get properly recognized, I just know it. Just these posts give me a new way to think about things and observe the world. Thank you.

    Laurel.

    • suddenwriteturn

      May 8, 2013 at 2:12 PM

      Thank you, Laurel. 🙂

  2. Rosemary Irwin

    May 6, 2013 at 11:35 AM

    This was just marvelous. The picture is worth a thousand words [you are a talented decorator] but the words say a lot about “home”–which we imagine is a safe quiet place but has its own pet residents and garden machine sounds. You should put a copy of this in a time capsule; it says so much about how it feels to live in the world as it is right now.

    • suddenwriteturn

      May 8, 2013 at 2:13 PM

      Home is where “I am.” There is no hardship, really, to this setup. And my husband is the true decorator in our household!

  3. Robin

    May 6, 2013 at 10:17 AM

    What a nice reflection! But it’s still helpful to have a pair of Bose noise-cancelling headphones and a rainfall or thunderstorm cd. They are 100% better than those big insulated shock-proof shooter’s ear protectors that got me through law school in a dormatory. Just having a tree top next to your desktop is worth all the other adjustments 🙂 Thanks for sharing!

    • suddenwriteturn

      May 8, 2013 at 2:15 PM

      Ha! I have those shooter’s ear protectors that I use when a certain someone is practicing drums! Otherwise, I can generally tune out most noises, or am patient enough to know that it will go away soon enough. Watching birds is the trade off. 🙂

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