My last post was about the challenges and hidden joys of moving one’s workplace into a new space. (And thanks for the many reads and comments that followed that piece.)
Today’s piece, while in the same department, is more about the inner work involved, that budgets, bosses and the fast moving world at large, might rarely ever consider.
But twenty-five years in one spot has seen its share of laughter, sadness, tears, giddiness, motion and energy that fill up a space and make it real to the young people and parents I work with. Even after several paint jobs over the years, a space lived into develops its own ‘place and power’ that “speaks” and is somehow known and felt by many who visit. One of the boys (age nine) I work with in his own way alluded to this fact even before the transitions began as he sat, legs dangling over the arm of his chair sipping a juice box. We had not discussed this either. In fact part of me wondered if it had more to do with the way I see and feel the world more than anything else. But when the inner wisdom of a child ‘speaks’ of it, I knew it wasn’t just me being sentimental about old and familiar haunts.
Knock-Knock!
Two weeks ago when most of the painting in our new space was done I was doing some touch-up and detail work that was better left for times when it’s quieter with few people around. It was late afternoon near the end of the school year when I heard a knock on the door. In fact, it was my first knock on the door in our new space. I was on the floor in the bathroom screwing something back in place and yelled out, “Hello! I’m in here!”
In came a girl from one of our groups, who had also helped to scrape and paint the week before. She stopped by to visit while waiting for her mom to pick her up. When she didn’t find me in our old office down the hall, she came down to what will be our new home in a matter of weeks. Chloe* chatted away while I did this and that. Because the new space has nothing in it still, Chloe first sat against the wall, then on a small step ladder as I moved about the new space doing this and that. Meanwhile, in between our rambling chatter Chloe kept checking her phone about every thirty seconds. (It’s a funny thing these days with teens and cell phones, and especially with girls, that whenever action stops, or things get boring, out come the phones to check texts, Facebook, whatever. And since watching me doing light sanding or scraping flecks of paint off of baseboards was certainly less than riveting, I wasn’t the least bit offended.)
Then Chloe’s phone started ringing. It was her mom to say that she couldn’t leave work as early as planned so it was agreed she’d hang with me until her mom could get here.. A minute or so passed and I head another knock, this time on the front window facing the front of Town Hall. A woman and her son had just picked up their beach sticker, saw me while leaving, and tapped to say hello through the open window.
After the brief window visit I began to polyurethane a bench that will hold our (hoped for) laptops, when Chloe announced,
”I’m tired. Can I go back to your office and lie down and listen to my music?”
“Sure,” I said. “Just make sure you hear your phone if your mom calls.”
”I will,” she said, and left.
New wood and wondering
As I treated the new wood I thought about the first “new knock” by Chloe earlier, and the window tapping hello by a mother and her son just minutes ago. For several weeks I’ve had to spend a lot of time preparing our new space and managing the transition while at the same time feeling my way through the process internally. For me, with the work I do, “place and space” are important elements to consider and at times it was challenging to convey this point to my bosses and even to some of my coworkers in the building.
For other offices who will be moving following my relocation, their main concern was wall space for filing cabinets and desks, while mine was meeting the needs of people, as individuals or in groups, who will actually be inside our new space and not standing at a counter looking in. This, and the thoughts of how best to help my clients and group members transition away from what they’ve known and felt secure within, into a new place, have been weighing heavily on me since this project began.
Suddenly the door flung wide open as Chloe walked back in, headphones on, lollipop in her mouth and carrying a couch pillow and blanket from the old office.
“You Okay?” I asked.
”Yep,” she said. “Just weird being there and you over here.”
Without saying another word Chloe spread the blanket out on the floor across the room from me, tossed her pillow down, plopped on her back and continued listening to her music.
At that very moment I realized that the energy and sense of place would indeed follow and that the most important part of “moving in” had just begun.
Kevin Lee
* “Chloe” was not my visitor’s real name.