My. Own. Office.

I have an office.

Don't think glass buildings and a view of the skyline through professionally cleaned windows.  Think more along the lines of I can look out  and see when the recycling truck is here, as long as I have first cleaned the dogs' nose prints off the window. 

It's not fancy.  It's not even pretty.  But it is MINE.  And I find myself really conflicted that I can be so over the moon about a tiny former bedroom when I've really tried to teach my children that the accumulation of stuff does not make you happy.  But here I am, in my office, with my stuff. and I'm happy. I even have a door!

Please understand that I have been working from home for several years now.  My office has been in a 36 square foot loft outside of one of the bedrooms and then in a 60 square foot corner of our bedroom.  It's been cramped.  It's been inconvenient.  It's been, at times, quite difficult to navigate around the work projects to fall into bed for a few hours and wake up with the work projects staring me in the face again.  And, let's face it, as patient as he is, Dale has spent many years trying to fall asleep to the sound of the keyboard and the light of my monitor.

The very day our oldest child moved into his own apartment, we moved my desk and filing cabinets. And by we I mean Dale.  He cleaned and hauled and disconnected and reconnected and made sure that I could still finish my project with minimal disruption. He brought up boxes of books from the basement.  He found tubs and tubs of all kinds of stuff  I've been saving.  He even found things like my former Wyoming license plate and my chili pepper lights which have been in storage for YEARS because they didn't really blend into the decor of any of our rooms.  Until now. 

I know.  Not very office-like, right?  But so very me.  This room is full of stuff that would make most people gag. It's certainly not going to win any awards in Architectural Digest.   Honestly, I don't want that.  I want to look around this room and smile, and I do.  Right there is my stuffed killer whale, Shampu.  Over there is one of my dad's caps.  On that wall is a painting of a lighthouse my mom did many years ago.  Right there are pictures of my boys.  Over there is a poster Dale talked a shopkeeper into giving us on our honeymoon.  On my desk is a vase of beautiful flowers my sister sent me for my birthday.  And right there is the license plate that resided on my little Honda Civic and that saved a friend from getting a ticket one night as he drove my car to his security job:

OFFICER: Son, you are driving in Texas with an expired Indiana driver's license in a car with Wyoming plates, and it's not even your car.  The only reason I am not going to give you a ticket is because I don't want to call in this plate and have dispatch laugh at me when I say, "That plate is One, Cowboy on a Bucking Horse, Four, Zero..."
MY FRIEND: Thank you, sir. [Drives off laughing.]

So, if you want to come by and see my office, you are more than welcome.  I'll show you the license plate, I'll turn on the chili pepper lights, we'll laugh over my yearbook pictures, and you can be impressed with my pink curtains.  And if you don't like my office, that's okay, too.  I do.

Did I mention that I have an office?