Home office blues

Shelter in place means stay home, but what is home? I feel most at home in my little house in the not-so-big woods, a house with lots of windows so every room offers views of trees and birds and other wild things. However, that house lack cell-phone access and reliable internet access, which I need for teaching my classes and surviving during the shelter-in-place order, so last Friday I packed up what I thought I would need for teaching my classes and took it all to the parsonage in Jackson, where the internet and cell-phone coverage are great but there's not much to see out of the windows.

On the plus side, I'll get to go through this struggle at my husband's side, and I can still go for walks out at the cemetery or at Lake Katharine after the weather clears up. On the minus side, I miss my woods, my birds, and my creek. Also, just a few days of relying entirely on my laptop have proved gruelling, causing elbow and neck pain, blurred vision, and headaches. I need the big computer monitor from my office and the docking station and external keyboard and mouse--and a desk to put it all on. I taught this morning from my dining-room table, which is not sustainable because it's small and we need to eat there, and somehow spilled salt ended up on all over my notes.

But we are safe and intending to stay that way. I'm reminded of the six months I spent doing chemotherapy and radiation, when I struggled through sleepless nights by visualizing a happier future or planning a long road trips down the Pacific Coast Highway. In 2011, I had the privilege of taking my California Literature students there during Spring Break, and when I stood on the shore of the Pacific at Big Sur with my health restored and a full head of hair, it felt like triumph. 

So today as I try to cope with neck pain and blurred vision and an uninspiring view, I keep trying to believe in a happier future when we can move freely about the country in the company of people we love. "Next year in California," I keep telling myself, and I might even come to believe it one day.

The view from my "office"

Where I really want to be right now

Updated to add: Just after I posted this, I noticed a robin building a nest under the eaves just outside my "office" window. I realize that having a choice of two places to live is a first-world problem that many people would welcome, but when this style of life starts feeling oppressive, it's good to be reminded that nature is still doing its thing out there, even if I can't always see it.