THE ONLY BLACK GUY IN THE OFFICE

WFH Taught Me How to Live in the Moment

Being cooped up in the crib has forced me to learn (and unlearn) some major habits

The Only Black Guy In the Office
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Published in
5 min readJun 15, 2020

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Illustration: Richard A. Chance

It’s been three whole months — 12 weeks, 84 days, 2,016 hours, but who’s counting? — since the beginning of my pandemic-sanctioned home confinement. Being holed up in the crib with the exception of grocery store runs and skeptical fresh air strolls has led me to hella different levels of stir-crazy. There was the manic-exerciser stage. The fridge-abuser stage. The PhD-in-WebMD stage. The clean-so-much-it-makes-my-moms-proud stage. The fuck-it-I’ll-just-count-my-floor-tiles stage. And now, the radical-self-reflection stage.

My day job has become both an energy drain and a useful distraction from the uncertainty of the current world. But without the physical distraction of co-workers snapping me out of my thoughts, I’ve realized that I’m changing a lot more than I expected to.

Planning things right now comes with the full understanding that they’ll probably change, so why not be present and roll with whatever time brings?

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The Only Black Guy In the Office
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Do you know him? Is it you? The trials and tribulations of a Black man navigating corporate life.