Selfish?

In the nearly a year that I have been working in the Real World at my current place of employment, two people in my group of about 22 people have passed away.

The first, was wholly unexpected. The guy was about 50 years old and had a sudden and massive stroke. He was on life support for a couple of days before passing. A week after he died, his 18 year old graduated high school. Horrible, horrible story. My grandfather had a stroke when I was about five and was never the same. I never really got to know him. Strokes and anyuerisms scare me more than anything. I was friendly with the guy, but never really talked to him at length. We tax attorneys tend to keep to ourselves.

The second, was a bit more expected, but still unsettleing. I summered where I work in 2007. I shared an office with her then. We shared the same exit door, but it is what we call a "walk-through." Her office was behind mine, with a wall and a door separating us. Our shared printer was in my bay, so I would see her at least several times a day. As just mentioned, we tax attorneys are not the most talkative, outgoing bunch, so we never engaged in any long discussions, but I still used her as a resource and asked her dumb questions like, "Where can I get more legal pads?" or "Can I recycle this, or should it be shredded first?" At the end of the summer, when I shredded a lot of my shit using her shredder, but letting her clean up the mess, I informed her that I would probably accept the offer and would see her in 2008. Turns out I wouldn't see her in '08. But I saw her twice in '09.

When I started working last Septemember I ended up in a different office. I stopped by to see her once, but she was not there. She was never there. Something had happened. Turns out, she had cancer. And not the good kind (not that there is a good kind).

And then, in early '09, someone in the group lateralled, and in the ensuing office reshuffle (I was eager to get out of my current office for a myriad of reasons, even though I had just scored a brand new desk they refused to cart to my new office), I ended up where I had spent the summer of aught seven (though it had been renovated, it now had a better bookcase and a whiteboard. Score! Crappy desk though). I took all the cool shit I had acquired in my three months in my old office, except for the desk and coat rack, and moved back into my old spot. And it essentially became my office. Sure it was a walk-through, but she was never in. The only reason someone would come into my office was because they wanted to talk to me or got me confused with the office next door where you pick up legal pads. There were drawbacks to having one's own office. Well, drawback. I usually get to the office late, around 9:30. But lots of time I do not get in until 10. Occassionally I miss the train that gets me to the office at ten and I end up in the office at 10:15. And thus, anyone walking down the hall can see that the light in my office is off. I am the only one with a key who shows up on a regular basis, and if the light is off, I am not in. I do not think anyone cares, but I am just a paranoid first year in the middle of a recession who gets worried about this shit. Sort of. I am fairly certain no one cares. As long as I get my shit done (or think I am getting it done).

But since I have been in my new old office, she has shown up twice. The first time she walked through the door and said, "Surprise!" as I frantically shoved the newspaper that I was doing the sodoku puzzle in under the desk. But I was surprised. She was not the same that I remembered. It was clear that the chemo and cancer had been very unkind to her. She was bald, wearing a neck brace, using a walker, and extremely skinny. It took a second for me to register who this was. If it had not been for a her voice, which I had not heard in 18 months, I do not think I would have recognized her. I can only hope that the look on my face did not shift from horrified to recognition and was merely confusion for a half a second before recognition. I cannot remember what I said to her after she said surprise, I can only hope that it was "Hi, nice to see you again" and not "Hi, how are you doing?"

When she came in again a month later, she looked better. She was not using the neckbrace. But she still did not look good. And it pains me that I have trouble remembering what she looked like before the cancer. I saw her almost every weekday for three months, and now I can only picture her as I last saw her (for what it is worth, when I try to construct the prior memories of her, she keeps looking like a female version of the old Rob from Get Fuzzy, which is not quite accurate).

A month ago, her mother and hospice worker came in to remove her personal items from her office. I did not realize it at the time, but she had likely taken a turn for the worse. My two bosses stopped by to chat with her mother, and though I had my headphones on, I usually keep the volume very low while working, and was able to hear what they were chatting about. No one had a bad thing to say about her. But at least they got to know her. She worked for us for 25 years. I got the impression that my bosses understood her fate, but were thought she could beat it. They understood the importance of standing behind her, and doing whatever was in their power to keep her in her proper position after she beat it. I was only overhearing, but I was very proud of my bosses. These are people you want to work for.

She did not beat it though. She passed over the weekend.

And I feel a bit selfish. No one where I work has as private an office as I do. We have an open door policy. However, the doors facing the hallway are always kept close. Hence, my office door is always kept closed. The other similarly situated offices are walk-throughs. Important people sit in the back office. Hence, others are always walking through the walk-through office. Other offices are offshoots of a lobby area, where the hallway doors open up into a lobby area that provides access to six or eight offices. Sure these offices can have their doors closed, but it is not really the way we roll. And thus, I am in a walk-through that no one walks through in an office with an open door policy where I cannot keep my door open.

Therefore, I have a more private office than most. As mentioned, no one comes into my office unless they want to talk to me. Rarely do people want to talk to me. Usually, it is just my bosses, either to hand me a case or pontificate about potential fantasy trades. Or occassionally, my paralegal friend stopping by because I am late in grabbing him for a smoke (his office is closer to the elevators). No one ever stops by to chat. And a random person will stop by to discuss something work related, though I can usually anticipate that because I have asked them to look at something.

So, for the most part, I can do whatever I want in my office without fear of pop-ins. This is nice for doing crosswords, sudoku, trying to get around the firewall, and, as was the case the other day, having some serious gas. The other night I decided to make a tuna casserole. I used a one of the big cans of tuna (not bulk size, but pretty big). As such, around 2 the next day, I had some serious gas. I started ripping farts left and right and straight down into my chair. If a fart is particularly nasty, I will light a match, but for the most part, if I have to fart, I let it rip, smell factor be damned. With another person sharing my office space, or with an office that people regularly walk-through, well there is a time to breathe and there is a time to squeeze, though that can lead to disasterous results.

Point being, I was sad to learn that she had passed. But I fear I may have been sadder to learn that seven months of private office may be coming to an end soon. I like having my own space. When the wind blows a certain way, I like knowing that I can break wind if that is what I desire. I wonder if a part of me hoped that she would beat it, so she could keep doing what she was doing, so that I could be ensured another five to seven years with a private office (assuming I stay here that long of course). Of course, it is not just the lassiez-faire farting I enjoyed. It was printing random crap. Playing brickbreaker while bored. Surfing the intertubes (to the extent the firewall allows me. Oh, and has anyone else noticed that google reader now starts showing the URL of the site you are readering, rather than treating it like a flash page where the only URL exposed was reader.google.com. What is up with this? Upcoming post on how google is becoming evil btw). Printing out the latest sports guy column and reading it at my desk as oppossed to on the computer so it looks like I am reading shit for work and not slacking on the intertubes.

So this is my apology to her. I am sorry I did not get to know you better. I know there is so much that I could have learned from you. Just today, I was struggling with a basic question about tax law that you would have known. Had you been there, I would have asked. I am sorry I did not ask more questions in the past. I am sorry I am selfish. I saw the e-mail saying that you had passed, and my heart hurt because you helped me in the past. I could have used your help in the future. But then I went to smoke with paralegal friend and told him my fears about the high mortality rate in my group. And I thought about how your passing would affect my private office. And I thought about how I could just take your case of bottled water and no one would care.

But mostly I am sorry that I did not get to know you better (yeah, its a repeat). I saw you many times for three months and I do not know anything about you. I am sorry. You are tougher than me. I wish I could have done more.