Red Cedar

A year ago we packed up the last of our things and left Vancouver. A year ago there was a big spaz about our money being transferred properly for our real estate deal so that while on the ferry to Gabriola we weren’t sure we would be allowed in the house we had just purchased. A year ago we got it all sorted out and slept on the floor of our new house, waiting for the next day when the moving van to arrive.

And so it’s been. One year.

There’s a lot of things I can say about this move – but the bottom line is that I am very glad for it, and I have no regrets about leaving the city for a small island, nor a desire to return to any city (even a smaller/cheaper one than Vancouver). We have just weathered a pretty crappy winter, with snow, power outages, and even a burst pipe caused by rats chewing through it in the kitchen- much of which I dealt with on my own while Brian was in the city. And even so ….

Because while some of the “convenience” of city life has receded,  so have a lot of other things – noise, traffic, anger, angst, crowded sidewalks, crammed buses, and the feeling of civility ever diminishing around me. These things have been replaced by spaciousness – time in the studio or the kitchen, on the beach, and in the woods – a zendo of my very own – and plenty of room to throw parties when we don’t feel like being quiet. Brian and I have discovered more quality interaction despite the fact he is away three days per week – it seems that full absence on some days leads to increased presence when we are together. With all external life toned down, I meet the pressures of work and my union more gracefully and with way less freaking out! There is simply more time and energetic space, and working from home has allowed for a better integration of my life and my working life.

This is not to say that all things are perfect – all communities have idiosyncrasies, and the smaller the place the more pronounced that are. Living in a community of retired people has meant that it’s been difficult to meet and make friends our age who don’t have young children. Also related to the retired population, there is some real fussbudgeting in the community – people who make a party of filing complaints against local businesses and individuals – which is a drag. And while most of the island is super welcoming, there is definitely a vibe in some quarters that people don’t want newcomers or changes to the island – even though a lot of these changes are just about the greater society changing (you might have noticed this whole boomer to millennial changing of the guard is causing some tension out there).

But you know, people are people wherever you go. And this island is full of pretty awesome people as well – from the local farmers who put most of the food on  my table, right on down to the folks who work at the foodbank and keep the Commons project afloat. I’m might impressed with the community-mindedness of this place overall – and although we don’t have a ton of time in our working lives, we try to drop in where we can.

In the last few weeks, we have met some local folks who might actually be friend material – our age, musician types, in our neighbourhood – which is pretty exciting. Not to mention the fact that our proximity to Victoria means that we’ve seen a lot more of our island people – friends and family – over the last year. Since we’ve been here I don’t think there’s been a single month without visitors – which very much plays to my hosting skills.

Although it’s only been a year, we’ve pretty invested here now – and I can’t imagine where else would allow us to be in a rural community and yet still close to city amenities and our families. We still have a place in the city if and when work calls us there – but for the long haul, this is where we have landed – and I’m feeling pretty good about that.

(Picture above is of a 72 million year old fossil that we found on the beach near our house. Video below was taken two weeks ago on the beach below our house at sunrise. Pretty great, eh?)

This week has presented a bit of an odd situation in that I was told that I may no longer have access to an office.

For the last (nearly) year, I have been working from home three days per week and in an office in Nanaimo one or two days a week days per week. Going into the office makes my days long because it involves a ferry, but it also ensures that I see people during the work week. My actual work team is in Ottawa (and spread around to other places too) and some days (like yesterday), I’m in phone meetings for most of the day anyways. All my work can be done remotely as I do web planning, information architecture and so on. My work team doesn’t really care where I sit because I’m on a phone/chat with them regardless of my physical location.

So, I’m trying to decide whether or not I should fight to keep this office space which is a something I’m sure I could win, or should I just let it go since there seems to be some reticence to allow me to keep “squatting” there. Technically I do not have a right to office space in Nanaimo, as I do not fit within that part of the organization. Things changed with my work reporting and now I must reapply for the space with new managerial signatures, or I could just keep using the space as I do until it’s eventually cut off and deal with that if it happens.

I’m not sure that going into the office really does much for me even socially as I don’t share work with anyone in that office, and I’ve had days when I go in and no one’s really around anyway. Also, when I work from home, I can do things like bake a loaf of bread or throw a load of laundry in – which gives me a much better work/life flow. Productivity for me (I have come to learn) does not depend on location, but on mental state – so that’s not really a consideration.

At the root, this is about identity. If I am part of an organization, what does it mean if I no longer have a physical space in that organization? Is it easier for them to let me go? Do I have less stature in the eyes of my colleagues? Also, as the president of my union local, is it weird that I no longer work in an office building?

What I’m considering at this point is holding off on the formal paperwork and simply moving to less time in the office overall to see what that feels like. This week, because I have a cold, I only went in one day. Next week I have required travel in the middle of the week to somewhere else so I probably won’t go in at all. Perhaps the week after I’ll work from home the whole week. And I’m also aware that building will be undergoing refit in the next few months which means that I will work from home exclusively to avoid the noise and mess.

I used to believe that I was not the kind of person who could work from home, but I’ve found in the last year that this isn’t true and that there are lots of advantages to this arrangement. I’ve got good work hygiene in that I do get dressed properly every day; have a separate work space that is not inside my home; keep regular work hours that I stick to. And when I am working from home, I start and end my days much earlier which works for my counterparts in other time zones.

So far, so good. But what if? What if? What if not being in an office makes me more vulnerable to layoff? What if I get isolated from my work group? What if I can’t control my work future the way I want to? When I explore this a bit more I see that what I want is something I can’t have – a way to predict the future, some kind of control that is elusive no matter where I sit.

I also have to acknowledge that this is true – I’m pretty sure this isn’t my last position inside my organization. I have no desire to move on just yet, but with eleven years to go until I collect my pension, I suspect there is at least one more change of position ahead. I can’t know that of course, but given my past eighteen years of employment – there’s a good chance that will be so. There’s even some chance that whatever I do next will be at least part of the time in Vancouver, not Nanaimo at all! So I don’t know how much any of it matters in the end, as long as I keep contributing, keep working, keep showing up on the phone for every meeting – I expect where I sit is less of an issue than I am making it.