The Renegade Writer Blog

Welcome to the “before” pictures of my office (click on pictures for a better view). It’s a bit of a mess, as you can see (and really, you can’t see the messiest parts of it in this picture) and so, in preparation for 2009, I’m sitting at the desk, getting ready to give it a little overhaul.

But first I need to make an important confession:

I don’t actually work here. Yes, this is the room that is designated “Alison’s office,” and in Manhattan, one doesn’t designate an extra bedroom lightly. I once did a lot of work in this office, spent whole days and weeks in here in fact, and I was really very organized.  But at some point — and I’m not even quite sure precisely when — I gradually began to abandon this space. And like any place abandoned, it slowly descended into chaos and decay.

I do know that the shift began when I started to travel more, and switched from using a desktop as my main computer to the the laptop, which I’ve now jammed in awkwardly in front of the keyboard.  The laptop-as-primary-computer makes a lot of sense for the way that I work: since I now travel about 10 days a month, I need to be able to be fully functional on the road, and I don’t want to worry about leaving a key document on the home computer. In fact, I’m just realizing although it’s been a few years, I never really re-thought my workspace as my career became more and more focused on travel writing. My office is set up for the writing career I had back in, oh, 2005, not today.

And as my goddess of home organization, Julie Morgenstern, points out in her book Organizing from the Inside Out: “Every time we go through a change, we experience a breakdown in our organizational systems. It’s inevitable, because we are dealing with a new set of realities, and it takes time to process the information and see clearly what we have to organize.”

It was inevitable! Inevitable! Inevitable! I really like that part.

So as it stands now, I venture in here to use the desktop for backups, and to use my external hard drive.  I also come in here to use the printer/scanner, which is still hooked up to the desktop, I never set it up with the laptop. I know, right? That’s totally silly. And it’s where my husband and I both sync our iPods. Mostly, I come inhere to dump paper and files someplace near my inbox (which is now overflowing) or into totebags on the floor. Yup, my filing system is totally overwhelmed and outdated as well.

Where do I actually work when I’m not on the road? Well I sometimes take my laptop to coffee house in my neighborhood, but mostly, I work on the couch, pictured below. It looks very cozy (especially with my cat Buzzy passed out there)  and it’s really nice for an hour or two in the mornings, but after a while it starts to hurt my back.

Which is crazy because I have an Aeron chair in my office! I like having the option to work on the couch, but I’d also like to be able to have a functional workspace again at home. So I’m going to keep a little diary here of my office reclamation project. It’s something I have to get done quickly, because I’m about to hit the road again. Any hints, tips or advice?  Let me know via comments. [ASW]