Every morning at 8:30, I?d put on a sweatshirt and yoga pants, brush my hair and slather on tinted moisturizer and a smack of lip balm. Destination: dining table. It was March 2020 and we had been asked to work from home.
Getting ready an hour before my 9:30 a.m. meeting meant I had enough time to nibble on a piece of toast and read the morning news. Sometimes, after waking up and walking out of my room, I?d find the table of the night before?a no-stem wineglass wafting sour, undrunk sips of wine, a crusted piece of fusilli, trickles of meat sauce now etched into the grainy wood. We?d had a big dinner; all of it cooked from scratch. It was the beginning of a pandemic and we had subscribed to the lifestyle of Dining In à la Alison Roman.
Before I started work, I?d wipe the table clean. I didn?t know it yet, but this would become the symbol of a new day?from dining to desk, from family to workspace. I?d plant a laptop, a French press, a mug, and a notepad and pen onto this makeshift escritoire. I was 12 weeks pregnant; the office of our 700-sq.-foot condo was being converted into a nursery. As a magazine editor, I had the privilege of spending my days at the table, flaunting knitted sweaters on Slack calls, puttering around the fridge and ruminating on the idea of motherhood first.
I daydreamed of the human growing inside of me while the 2020 almanac swapped full moons with the rise and fall of COVID cases. I giggled at work-from-home memes on social media, but in reality...