I haven’t worked in the office at my day job since March 2020, and when my company requested on Friday that we start going in a couple days a week, I had mixed feelings. Like many, I miss casual social interactions and the randomness of office life, but I also love the conveniences of working from home, which are many, especially for those of us living the sandwich-generation life.
Plus, what to wear?
I don’t really know what people wear to work anymore, so today I let the weather decide (big snowstorm, record-breaking -30°C windchill) and went with a coatigan (swacket?) over a graphic tee and wool pants. Then I added my scarf, long down puffer, mukluks, trapper hat, and sheepskin mitts, lol. 😭 Mon pays ce n’est pas un pays, c’est l’hiver.
I was most excited to break out my indoor shoes, which I haven’t worn since the pandemic begin. I had bought them at the start of 2020, in deep winter, and kept them in my filing cabinet to change into at the office (like Mister Rogers—hello neighbour). When we shifted to working from home, I shoved them to the back of the closet along with all my random work paraphernalia and promptly forgot about them.
A lot has changed over the past 2.5 years, but I’m somewhat relieved to discover I still like these shoes. And it turns out I still sort of like going to the office, too. Yes, the commute is long and people are annoying, but it’s also refreshing to work in an actual workplace. While I appreciate having a job I’m able to do from any location, I can see how it is beneficial to draw better-defined lines between things. Home/office. Indoor/outdoor. Work/life.
We shall see. We shall see.
:) Teresa
What is happening even?? Closet Dispatch is a free, limited-run weekly newsletter by Teresa Wong.
Old French Lady -- hey, one of them just won the Nobel Prize in literature!