“How lucky! You get the best of both worlds!” Friends gush when I tell them that I work from home. Well, that’s exactly what I thought when the advertising agency I am with, gave me the opportunity to work remotely.
No more morning madness. No more juggling cooking and cleaning and washing and what not. No more dressing up to the nines. No more racing to avoid that late mark. And my daughter doesn’t have to come home to an empty house after school. It was all pluses.
The first few months, I congratulated myself for the ‘best decision I had ever taken in my life’. I relished the unhurried breakfasts, the quiet newspaper reading, and the me-times I never had before. I had the whole house as my office and with hardly any distractions (other than the lure of snacking and dayime TV), I wrapped up assignments well before the deadlines. And my family came home to a neater home, healthier dinners, cleaner towels and a more bearable me. I finally achieved the perfect work-life balance. Or so I thought until…
Tinkering and tampering
“I’ve asked the electrician to come today,” informs the hubby. I subtly remind him it’s a ‘working day’ for me, “so can’t it wait till Saturday or Sunday?” “He won’t take more than 15 minutes,” he says. I agree. When the electrician arrives, he takes 45 minutes to find what is wrong. Every five minutes, he calls out asking for this and that, and by the time he leaves I am an hour behind schedule. He is followed by the plumber, the car mechanic and the carpenter. All the miscellaneous pending work gets done, while my well-planned time tables come undone.
For whom the bell tolls
The doorbell rings. I am in my office, I remind myself. No need to answer. It rings again. What if it’s something or someone important, I start thinking.
After the third bell, I panic. I get up and answer the door. It’s the delivery guy. “Can you take in this parcel, ma’am? House No. 25 is locked. Can you give it to them when they are back?” Oh yes, I say, upholding the spirit of good neighbourliness. As word gets around the colony that I’m at home all day, I soon become the info-point for mundane queries (Has the sabziwali come yet?) and the drop-off point for house keys.
Mum’s the word
It’s a school holiday and the juniors are at home. I shut myself in a room for noise reduction and tell them I’ll be ‘back home’ by 1’o clock. Halfway into my work, I hear a knock on my door. ‘Amma?’ It’s my daughter. “I am working. Don’t disturb me.” I answer, a bit annoyed. She leaves. Soon, my phone rings. It’s her. “Please don’t shout at me. I just wanted to ask your permission to go out and buy snacks,” she says. “Do whatever you want, don’t bother me,” I tell her, and hang up. The next second, I open the door and call out to her to be careful while crossing the road.
What am I doing!
What do you do all day? Not all my colony-mates seem to understand. “You should get out more. It’s good for your Vitamin D,” my elderly neighbour tells me. “I work from home, aunty, like I work in the office,” I reply. “From Monday to Friday, 9 a.m. to 5 p.m.” I add. She smiles, and I feel happy she understands. But two days later I get an invite from her for a kitty party, and when she doesn’t hear from me she calls me on the phone: “Please come, it’s only for an hour, beta .”
I am now implementing a new strategy — dress the part and walk the talk. To start with, I turned the small odds-and-ends room at home into my new cabin, complete with an ergonomic chair and an ‘Office’ sign on the door. And yes, I dress up in the morning for all the neighbourhood to see.
seethajayan@gmail.com
