It has occurred to me, perhaps quite late, that if the rest of the internet, spam included, is to be believed, then the one thing I do that everyone wants to know about, is the one thing that I, for some tawdry and illegitimate reason, never see fit to write about. Namely, I work from home.
If the internet is to be believed, this simple act, this working from home, is a hot commodity. I may be doing it all wrong, since I’m not yet generating hundreds of thousands of dollars an hour just by sitting and clicking. But even though I do have to think and yes, at times, work, I believe I can boast of certain work-at-home benefits not generally described in work-at-home advertising.
Before I get into that, let’s just clear up one thing: I do not work in my pajamas. I don’t know why all the work-at-home ads start with some bleary blurb about working in pajamas. If you think about it, that’s not all that sexy. Possibly not even all that comfortable.
I work in jeans. In summer, I’ll often wear dresses. Sometimes, I’ll stagger around in workout clothes for half a morning, or, on Fridays, yesterday’s pants. But never do I work in that in which I sleep. For one thing, that would be chilly. For another, the vinyl of the kitchen chair which has passed for ergonomic for nigh on two years now would stick to my skin. But this is too much information.
The non-financial (some might say, “priceless”) benefits which I enjoy from my home-office-based lifestyle include:
- Going to the grocery store when it is not crowded
- Showers, any time I want
- Banking online even though I could go to the bank when it is not crowded
- Cooking lunch. On the stove. With real vegetables
- Naps
- Showers, as often as I want
- Yoga and dance practice breaks
- Singing along to the music I listen to, which is any music I want, even music with parental-advisory lyrics, even the same one song, over and over and over again, when that is the kind of day it is
- The whole entire Internet, uncensored
- Did I mention showers?
How do I do it? What is it exactly that fills my time? And how do I make it all seem so hard-won and full of effort? Why would I discourage you from trying the same thing? These, and many more mysteries will be plummed, explored, and finally, exploited, right here, in this space, on a daily basis from now on.
Befriend: