Weekend Onesie: Pack Up Your Old Kit Bag...

Weekend Onesie: 

Pack Up Your Old Kit Bag...

This week, on Tuesday, I had to go into the office and pack up my things.

No, I'm not fired. Or laid off. I remain very gratefully and gainfully employed.

However, in order to reconfigure every floor of every building on our campus so they are covid-compliant (what does that mean?), they asked that we pack our business necessary stuff, jettison all that we could, and take home our personal belongings.

Two or three years ago, I championed a similar cause that got squashed due to a lack of funding (and willingness). Facilities wanted to move to a model where people would no longer hide in cubes, thus, no longer have an assigned seat. Every morning, we would gather our items from an assigned locker (like high school) and find a place to work for the day. It was to encourage innovative thinking and allow people who normally never laid eyes on one another some facetime. 

Well, I was all for it. I saw it as a means of divorcing people from their hoards. Seriously, I have people stockpiling office supplies like they're canned goods.  I have people who haven't quite gotten on board with the whole paperless/save a tree movement; they still print every damn email they've ever received. There are people who scour conference rooms throughout the day looking for leftover food; open their filing cabinets and you will dozens and dozens of cans of expired soda, unrefrigerated orange juice, bags of stale chips and plates of questionable cookies. And then there are those who use their cube to conceal an issue they can't bring home with them... such as, the lady who spends her day shopping for shoes on-line, purchasing so many pair, that she has to have them shipped to the office, where she stacks them up under counters and in cabinets - all so her husband doesn't find out.

But this change? It wasn't meant to be. We ran into budget issues - as in, the man who held the purse strings didn't want to open them. Oh, he wanted the whole floor reconfigured, but he didn't want it coming out of his cost center. 

Then, there was a big upheaval, the fourteenth reorganization I've been part of in 13 years (actually, we just completed #16), and the whole idea got put aside. 

Fast forward to today. 

With people starting to return to the office  - or wanting to return - Facilities felt this was the time to move the company forward. The number of days per week that you choose to work in the office on a regular basis will determine whether or not you are assigned a permanent home - a cube or an office. Those who choose to work from home three or more days a week will no longer have a place to call their own. Instead, each morning, they will need to use an app on their cell phone and find themselves an available chair.

This change in landscape also means people can get rid of as much stuff as possible. 

When we came in to clean out our spaces we were handed a box - one box. And it wasn't a big box (2.5'x3'X3'). And that was it. What we absolutely need to work was to go into the box... everything else? 

Buh-bye. 

For me? It was freeing. 

The actual event wasn't to start until 8:00 am; I arrived at 5:30 am. I scrounged about and located two boxes with lids - the kind reams of paper come in. Then I started sorting the contents of my cabinets into various piles, which would then be deposited in appropriately labeled (electronics, office supplies, recycle, etc.) giant boxes provided by Facilities. By 9:00 am I had cleared out: 2-5 drawer towers, 2-wide 4 drawer file cabinets, a mini three drawer cabinet, and  my desk.

Every time I picked something up, I looked at it, asked myself, "have I needed this in the last year and a half?" The answer was almost always 'no' and into a pile it would go. My piles would reach a certain size and I would scoop it all up and sort it into the appropriate bin. 

What did I learn?

I learned what condiment packets look like after sitting in a drawer for a year and three months. (Big and puffy.)

I learned that unrefrigerated (because it required none) orange juice separates into three layers - two grey and one a peculiar sickly yellow. 

I learned that paper files are pretty meaningless. I kept a few documents because they had signatures on them, but the rest has been scanned ages ago.

I learned I used to buy a lot of stupid supplies. And received a lot of stupid gifts.

I learned where a bunch of CDs I'd burned in 2018 and 2019 have been hiding. 

I learned what a peace lily looks like when no one waters it for a year and three months.

I learned I don't have an patience, respect or time for most of my co-workers. 

I learned that a lot of what I used to value about my job... has nothing to do with my job. 

Now, oddly, there was only one other person there that early in the morning. We'll call him 'Nick' (because that is his name).

'Nick' is an odd one. He's 40-something and has no life. I used to  typically get into the office at 5:30 am. 'Nick' would arrive at 6:00 am. We would be the only ones there until just before 8:00 am. He's the sort who makes small talk, so I would avoid him by running around 'doing things'. This day was no different, except, of course, I had not seen 'Nick' in about a year and three months. 

'Nick' is part of one of our audit teams. He is the kind of employee whose chief concern while conducting an audit with the FDA is... the food. 'Nick' will not eat cafeteria food. 'Nick' is very vocal and will go on at length about how horrible food their food is.  'Nick' will only eat food that is brought into the building and is of the 'fast food' variety. 

Did I mention 'Nick' lives alone? 

Can you guess why 'Nick' lives alone?

He's a fathead. No, he's not obese. Not at all. Out of shape? Hmmm, probably. But not obese. Yet. 

'Nick', in the ten years that I have known him, is only concerned about 'Nick'. The way he talks about our company? I'm not sure why 'Nick' is still employed. Because apparently everything about the company we work for is bad, wrong, stupid, out of step, insipid, and unnecessary.

Now, it's not like 'Nick' has any solutions or intention of fixing any of it. No, because then he would have nothing to talk about... except how lousy the cafeteria food is.

'Nick' is very negative, except when he wants something. Then? He becomes a big brown-noser.

'Nick' has been brown-nosing me since the day I was introduced to him. Normally? I don't mind a face between my ass cheeks. But, I don't like 'Nick.' 

Sadly, I don't think anyone does. 

On this morning, each time I would take a pile of stuff to the boxes, to sort of and dispose of it, I had me a little shadow. I would place something in a box and 'Nick' would pick it up and look at it. Every third item? 

He kept. 

I said nothing. Me, hiding behind my mask?  I shared nothing. All he had to read were my eyes. And, me? Unfortunately? I have big Don Knotts eyes (or, at least, I think I do). I don't react, I mug - like I'm in an old-fashioned melodrama. So my peepers are questioning why 'Nick' thinks the things I'm throwing away are keepers.

As the morning drags on, I come to realize: it's none of my business. 

Yes, 'Nick' lives alone. But not very. I expect to see him on an episode of Hoarders very soon. 

But back to the task at hand. I finish. My boss comes in, I give him the lay of the land and let him lock himself inside his office. If I had 'some' stuff? He has much, much more. In fact, he has three predecessor's worth of stuff to go through... carefully. The more I looked at all the papers and files he had to review? The more I was thinking going paperless is, indeed, the way to go. 

I kept thinking I should offer him some kind of help. But what could I do? As far as what my boss does with all that  stuff?

It's none of my business. 

So, by 9:00 am? I am done. I slap some white labels with my name on the things I must keep (all of which does not fit in that tiny little box.) I load up two boxes and two giant bags of personal stuff and I leave. There's a huge luncheon planned, but I have no intention of breaking bread anywhere near these people. Too many people not wearing masks. Too many people thinking that this event is a high school reunion. I am outta there. Whatever transpires the rest of the day?

None of my business.

I get home and power up my work laptop. There's an email from a team leader. She wants to keep her team together. Should she put in a move request with facilities to ensure that everyone will get to sit together? And if so, how does she do that? 

I write back... "Keep in mind, that when we do return in September, not everyone will have a cube or an office. So, I'm not sure that such a request makes any sense given our new working model." 

And it's true. 

Come September? Nothing will be the same. 

Certainly, not I. 

I'm fortunate. I have a very understanding boss. We chuckle over many of the same silly things people see as important. We're both big picture people. So, those who get stuck on little picture things? We shrug our shoulders and smile. Although, when someone is critical of something small, and I can do something about it, I will try to fix it for them. I want them to think that I care. 

Or at least, I used to want them to think that I cared. 

Now? It's none of my business. 

When we return in September, I do not expect to have a dedicated anything. I plan to work from home at least three days a week. 

When I do return in September? I will share a lot less; less of myself, my thoughts, my opinions. Yes, I'm checking out... of that giant hotel of an office building, and my job. 

There's no hill there worth dying on. 

And it's none of my business because it's not my business. 

Oh, I'm still on the bus. I plan on staying on the bus until I reach where I want to go or am told that this is the last stop. It's warm on the bus. I know almost every seat on this bus. So, I won't be getting off the bus until then. 

But I am planning on being quieter while on the bus. Not changing seats. Not joining in sing-a-longs. Not asking a lot of questions of the driver. 

*Where are we going? I don't know. 

When will get there? I'm not certain. 

All that I know is...

It's none of my business. 

--- ---

Hope you're enjoying the weekend.

Take good care of yourselves!

*Thank you, Lerner and Loewe

-uptonking from Wonderland Burlesque

Pack Up - Eliza Doolittle

Wouldn't It Be Loverly?  from My Fair Lady

Audrey Hepburn/Marni Nixon

Paint Your Wagon (I'm On My Way) -

Julie Andrews, Robert Goulet and Joel Grey

Where Am I Going? - Barbra Streisand