Contagion: Pretend Commutes

 

Vaughn bringing his teacher,
Mrs. K, a present

There was a delightful article in today’s Wall Street Journal:  Welcome to the Fake Office Commute (Turns Out People Miss the Routine).  It seems the people who have been working from home since March, miss commuting.  They miss it to the point where they are creating fake or pretend commutes to fill the gap.

In one sense, it is counter intuitive to want or need to create fake commutes.  After all, not having to commute saves both time and money.  When I don’t have to drive to the university, I save an hour to an hour and a half each day.  I can use that time to work longer or spend more time in my leisure activities or hobbies.  I save on gasoline and put less miles on my car.

On the other hand, the commute is a buffer time between home and office.  This applies whether one walks to work, takes public transportation, or drives.  The commute in is a time to prepare for the day and mull over what is on the agenda.  The commute home is a time to reflect on the workday and decompress in preparation for home life.  There is also something to be said for change of venue.  There is home.  There is being out and about during the commute.  And, there is the workplace. 

Since moving to Chicago, my commuting has involved driving.  In the morning, it is a great time to catch up on the news by listening to NPR’s Morning Edition.  I might stop to get a cup of coffee or get a breakfast sandwich.  On the way home, I alternate between making phones, listening to music, and listening to NPR again.  I might stop off to pick up a few things from the store. 

In the article, people take a walk before starting their workday and maybe do it again at the end.  They actually started this ritual specifically as a pretend commute.  I try to take a walk every day, but I have never regarded it as fake commuting.  I view it as a good way to use the time I saved on commuting.  There was a salesman that takes a drive to get a cup of coffee.  He drives by several local coffee places to pick one up downtown.  Being a salesman, he used to hate fighting traffic to get from one appointment to the next.  A few times a week, he actually goes out to drive around in rush hour traffic… because he misses it.  Commuting is a routine and it is only natural to miss a daily routine and thus try to recreate it in some form or fashion.

I was grinning when I saw the title of The Wall Street Journal Article.  I believe this idea of the creating a fake or rather a ritual commute came from my daughter Armené.  It was back in 2019, well before this Covid-19 pandemic had so many of us working.  Armené and her two sons, Vaughn and Sasoun, were home bound.  They were living the quarantine lifestyle do to Sasoun having Severe Combined Immunodeficiency (SCID), the bubble boy syndrome.  You can read about it and how they reacted to it:

• 
  Feeling Thankful
• Her Son Was Born With "Bubble Boy Disease" — Here's How They Lived in
  Isolation For More Than a Year

Vaughn was supposed to go to pre-school at the age of four in the fall of 2019.  He couldn’t go because there was a very real risk of him bringing germs into the house.  He was so looking forward to it.  So, his mother, an elementary school teacher, decided to home pre-school him and created routines to give it a real pre-school feel.  Everyday, he would don the uniform (school logoed polo shirt and shorts) he would have worn to school.  They would have breakfast, pack his knapsack with his school workbooks, pencils, and markers.  They would make a lunch and snacks, put them in the lunch bag that came with the knapsack.  Vaughn would put the backpack on his back and a cap on his head.  He would kiss his mom and say, “Bye Mom, see you later.”  She would say, “Have a good day in school.”  Then he would walk around the downstairs down the hall, into the living room, through the dining room and kitchen and back to where his mom was in the family room.  He would say, “Good morning Mrs. K.”  He would sit down and take what he needed from his backpack to work on.  At the end of the school, he would again pack up his backpack, say by to his teacher, make the reverse commute and, upon seeing Armené would say, “Mom… I’m home from school.”  Then, they would have a snack, and talk about his day at school.  She took a video of it and everyone that watched it had a tear in their eye it was so cute and precious.

You can see why I attribute this idea of the fake or, better yet, pretend commute to my daughter.