The Uninvited Guest
Note: I wrote this essay a while ago during the pandemic. 5 years later I dug it back up and felt very nostalgic about a bygone era everybody has now tried to forget. Enjoy!?
Today, I woke up in my childhood bedroom with the planets of the solar system still dangling above my headboard. After my morning shower, I trudge downstairs to eat breakfast with my fellow co-workers: mom and dad. I dine on my usual helping of cocoa puffs — a throwback to elementary school — while staring down the daily headlines of whatever sick, twisted nightmare we all find ourselves in.
When the clock strikes 10:30am, I wallow back to my childhood bedroom which will serve as my productivity command center for the next 10 hours. As I sulk in the captain’s chair, I perform my daily ritual of coming to grips with our shared harsh reality: we all live at work.
By now, I’ve had time to read the countless op-eds and hot-takes about the pandemic’s lasting effects on the future of work. Some companies have allowed employees to stay permanently remote even after the pandemic ends. On the other end of the spectrum, stubborn CEOs have fiercely preached about yanking all their workers back into the office the moment a vaccine materializes. For many more, there seems to be a favored hybrid option of only coming into the office a few days per week.
Underlying all of these conversations about how will we work is an even more pressing question: how will we live?
Some have advocated for digital nomad lifestyles, where you hop around from one pricey Airbnb to another. Others have ended up moving from their dense cityscapes to the distant countryside so they can live out their cottagecore fantasy. I even see nascent couples moving in together to “give it a shot” and a record-breaking number of marriage proposals on social media. And if you’re like me, you’ll find a huge swath of young adults living back home with their family, saving money while we bide our time.
Regardless of living arrangement, you are now an employee in your own home. Editing spreadsheets in bed, taking meeting calls in the kitchen, reading project proposals in the bathroom — work has permeated into every part of the intimate space you once saw as a refuge from long days at the office.
Speaking of long days, you’ve probably noticed that you’re also working more hours than before! There’s nothing to look forward to after work anymore because most things are closed. And for the few places that remain cautiously open: you’re still scared of dying.
Because your best option is to stay home, you’re stuck with only a few activities. Doomscrolling through Twitter is my personal favorite. I’ve also signed up for every online streaming service imaginable. And when I’m not doing either of these things, I can start to feel my closed work laptop staring me down from the corner of my bedroom. It sits smugly on my desk as it freely leeches off of my electricity without remorse. I can practically hear it whispering “Yeah, that’s right (REDACTED)! You work for ME now!”
“Hmmm I should probably finish writing that document that’s due this Friday”, I think to myself. I glance at my watch, realizing that it’s only 8pm on a Monday.
I open my work laptop anyway.
Now, don’t get me wrong. I absolutely love my work. My team is amazing, and I’m blessed to have a job like mine during one of the worst economic downturns in recent history. But I can’t help but feel sad nostalgia about a bygone era where I once had my best friends living next door to me and enough freedom to start my own country.
In a world where we no longer move great distances to live where we work, we are now cursedly blessed with the flexibility of working where we live. Many so-called visionaries have been optimistic about this new reality but I’m still not convinced. As the term “working from home” has mutated into “living at work”, the bond between our lives and livelihoods has become disturbingly intimate.
Like your unfiltered, conservative uncle coming over to stay for Thanksgiving. Or perhaps your bum roommate from college who doesn’t realize when they’re overstaying their welcome. Our work has unapologetically reared its ugly head into the part of our lives that we swore would remain untainted.
In every way imaginable, it has become The Uninvited Guest.