I spent the better part of New Year’s Day rearranging my workspace. It was a spur-of-the-moment compulsion, certainly not intended as some grand gesture of renewal. But I suspect that’s what I was after.
This is my third configuration since landing in this apartment. It feels like at least as many lifetimes have passed since that initial unboxing of possessions. Who would’ve thought, I think, remembering the shape of life back then. Who would’ve thought.
My desk now floats near the center of the room, away from the drafty window and spitting radiator that provided a welcome excuse prevented me from sitting there before. “Like a corporate executive!” I proclaim and then laugh, as nothing could be further from my reality.
One would not expect it to take an entire day to move one chair and one console-table-turned-desk approximately eight feet, but it did. Because of the books. There were dozens (hundreds? I didn’t dare count) scattered all over the room, in neat stacks and toppling piles. Heaps of books with well-worn spines and others yet-to-be-cracked.
“Have you read them all?” people ask, if ever they come over. “Not all, but most,” I reply. I suspect this will always be true.