In her columns, our collaborator Nathalie Plaat calls on your stories. To relaunch the season, she asked you if, between the world falling and the one trying to stay upright, you manage to find your little moments of off-leash racing. Called “News from you”, this section offers you a selected extract.
Stopping at the coffee machine, returning a half-awake smile to my colleague. Take the corridor and its gray carpet, greet your early-rising colleagues. Drop off my bags to go to the back of my row of colleagues, greet Suzanne and Émilie who are bathing in the rays of the sun from the large bay window and this day of work ahead of us. I am not the first arrival, nor the last. A cascade of “good mornings and good mornings in a hurry” awaits me, as soon as I am seated at my post.
I crossed my gaze the director with whom I must have an urgent discussion. It’s early, no one has ambushed his office yet. I try the gentle approach, coffee in hand, in the doorway. He greets me with a nod. The signal. I can move forward. The case is discussed and settled in a few minutes. My coffee did not have time to cool.
The other colleagues of my team arrive, the most vocal. They finish waking me up. The telephones yawn in turn, the keys on the keyboard produce a strange cacophony. Everyone gets busy in front of their screen, in a room, around the coffee machine, on the phone. We commune in this frenzy until the first stomachs wake up. The grunts on the smell of the fish meal of one, the wonders on the small dishes of this somewhat foodie colleague who tells us about his love for Ottolenghi’s recipes. For thirty or even fifty minutes, the sound of microwaves replaces that of keyboards. Others rush off to their business dinner or a friend who works downtown.
In the life after…
A quickly curled bun, soft pants, barefoot, I head for my workstation in the corner of my living room. I counted 20 steps, 14 to get to the coffee machine and six to the toilets which are halfway between the coffee machine and my office.
I turn on the workstation and the coffee machine almost simultaneously. My cat asks me for its food. This will be my first conversation in the morning and the only one until 11:00. The sound of my own voice startles me. I hadn’t heard myself yet. I sound strange to my ears. I find it hard to articulate a clear thought to this colleague on the phone. “Wait, I’ll send you an email, that’ll be better,” I hear myself say.
The rest of the morning drags on and files clash, meetings rain down. My stomach beckons. 11:55 a.m.
Six steps.
I look distractedly in the fridge. A piece of bread here, a piece of cheese there. And presto, I consult the emails entered between bites.
Five minutes.
I will return. The walk outside will wait. I’m lazy and not enough time. I go back to my seat. Another meeting, another email. I get up to drink water.
Fifty steps since the beginning of the day.
My neck hurts. My cat lies on the keyboard. I go out for a few moments on the balcony. I see the children coming home from school. I envy them.
My Teams is ringing. I go home.
Twenty-seven steps.
Mine won’t be long either. I have to wrap up the files before their day grabs mine. See you earlier. For them, I am a piece of furniture from the corner of the house. They get up and I’m already there, they come back and I’m still there. “Mom, what did you do today?” »
Seventy-seven steps, five meetings, 45 emails read, 30 dealt with. A half-checked list.
little day
Do you like working from home?
No, I hate that. I miss the frenzy of a collective and lively workspace, discussions without interference or “mutated” microphones, flesh to flesh.
I’m not one of those people who find telecommuting enjoyable, as all these surveys and media articles seem to give the impression.
I traveled in the four corners of my four and a half for two years, believing that I was going to find the comfort that a majority seemed to have found. It did not happen. Telecommuting has fossilized and atrophied me.
I don’t have a backyard, a cottage in the countryside, a furnished room… my office sits in the middle of my living room and taunts me even when I’m at the table. He watches me and I look at him.
Virtual work sucked me in, emptied my mind of its gray matter. I was a bedridden wreck for several weeks. Unable to concentrate, to take those few steps that separated the bathroom from the coffee machine. No more steps… Bedridden, psychologically, emotionally and physically drained.
Until recently, I was unable to touch a computer screen. For several months, more or less eight.
I have been rehabilitating myself for a few weeks and I have to go there in leaps and bounds. Me the chip and the other giants who look down on my steps and do not understand the titanic effort that it requires. I admit that I myself find it difficult to understand this phobia. This vacuum of anguish that sucks me in when I brush my finger against the bag of the desktop computer, placed in a corner of my house, yet harmless.
The Beast I nicknamed her.
How am I as bad as others if I believe my therapist. And yet, no one talks about these vulnerable teleworkers..
How I go ? I’ll get over it.