The Home Office Chronicles 1

If I've pulled my gray hairs out once I've pulled them out...well never mind. Thursday I rearranged my home office for the umpteenth time and once again was nearly driven to drink by that Villainous Octopus of Computer Umbilical Cords. No matter how many times I bumped my head on the underside of my desk there were still too many unruly cords snaking over my workspace, each unlabeled end needing to be plugged into my laptop so that several humming and jamming peripherals could tell my laptop what the heck they were up to. It was hopeless. I drank another pot of coffee. Then I took a micro vacation into town to sail the electronic isles for something, anything, to do battle with.

In the Isle of The Octopus itself I found the answer hanging from a limb of the display. It was a Hub. The breath was literally knocked out of me. I stood dumbfounded, mesmerized, in worship of the thing. A Hub. Of course! I plucked the radiant flower and ran ecstatically through the checkout flashing my charge card. At home I tore into the package like a woman on a desert island with a washed ashore shoebox. The Hub glowed in my hands. I loved it, it loved me, we were one. I plugged all my peripherals into the back of the magical Hub. The cords cascaded over the back of my desk, out of sight and finally out of mind. The little Hub attached just one delicate tendril cord into the side of my laptop and we were complete. My thumb drives sat like two honeybees on top of the Hub, ready and waiting to gather data on my whim. Two printers were now joined in marriage with my laptop. The WiFi was perpetually ready and blinking. My laptop was connected and ready to transfer data to my backup CPU.

At last, the octopus was tamed. Ah, technology is good. My home office has been redeemed.

(This is a reprint from my article printed in the News review February, 2009)

A home where time stood still

 That’s the first thought I had when the son of the deceased owners showed me the home which I would list and sell for him. 1973 is what I saw all around me. Lovingly cared for parlor lamps, patchwork quilts, watercolors and sets of china. When many homeowners are scurrying to Home Depot to get the latest home improvements, this home remained a piece of history, untouched, fine the way it was, well lived in, a relic, a home. The son, now middle aged, showed me his old room. His boyhood books sat sentry in the recessed headboard. A maple student desk still held an ample supply of lined notebook paper. The only new addition to the room was his golf shoes and polo shirts. He still slept in his old room when he returned for visits. He took me out to see his father’s workshop not used since 1979. Tools of all kinds sat unused along with tackle boxes and old blue Coleman ice chests. An old air compressor with its 1950’s science fiction movie rocket fuselage sat patiently waiting for it’s next launch. Wood shavings from the last honey-do project dusted the miter saw, wood chisels lay where they were last cast aside. Only a few hand tools, a hammer and screwdrivers, littered an area used by the son for occasional maintenance of the home he visited rarely but was reluctant to part with. The son handed me the keys. Everything was to be sold as it stood. He would take nothing, not even his old set of golf clubs. He would leave it the way he remembered it, the way we want to remember the people we loved, standing, smiling, looking ahead.