Office Life

Marina worked from home and took pride in two things: a ficus plant that had survived three quarterly reports, and her ability to stay silent on morning calls so professionally it could count as a skill. That Tuesday, all she wanted was to sit through the weekly status call in peace, sip her coffee, and give one serious nod into the camera when someone said “synergy.” It was a modest plan, almost therapeutic.

But one minute before the call, her neighbor’s cat flopped onto the keyboard. Marina sometimes agreed to watch him “for half an hour.” Half an hour, like corporate deadlines, turned out to be mostly decorative. The cat hit the raise-hand button, turned on a little fire reaction, and somehow changed her display name to “Marina Final_v2_REAL.” Her manager saw the raised hand and said brightly, “Marina, perfect, walk us through the update.” Startled, she accidentally switched on a filter that gave her enormous mustaches.

Trying to turn it off quickly, Marina yanked the mouse, clipped her mug, and sent coffee across her notebook. The notebook fell straight onto the space bar. Her microphone came alive and began broadcasting a rhythmic “pff-pff-pff,” like a very tired steam engine had joined the team. Her manager decided this was a new signal for technical risk and asked everyone to “capture it in their notes.” While her coworkers dutifully wrote down the steam engine, the cat pressed share screen and displayed Marina’s spreadsheet, where she privately marked priorities in three colors: green, yellow, and “oh no.”

That, somehow, saved everyone. People became so sincerely interested in the “oh no” column that for the first time in six months, the meeting turned useful. By the end of the call, the team had already reassigned tasks, and her manager said Marina had “bravely brought humanity into the process.” Now at every status call, people ask her to “show that color system.” The cat, unfortunately, still attends too. He sits by the laptop like middle management, waiting for his moment.

That morning, Marina wanted only two simple things: to survive the weekly online meeting quietly and finish her coffee while it still remembered being hot. She sat at her kitchen table, opened her laptop, and placed the new company microphone beside her. The IT guy had ceremoniously called it “a solution for clear communication.” In corporate life, that usually means something is about to develop a personality.

When her manager asked Marina for a quick project update, the microphone transmitted a rich, confident purr instead of her voice. Marina’s cat, Plushka, had rubbed his cheek against it at exactly that moment, and the noise-canceling system had apparently decided that humans were a passing trend while the cat was the real subject-matter expert. The chat immediately lit up with: “Thanks, Marina, we can hear there are certain risks.” Flustered, she reached to mute herself, hit a spoon, and sent it into her cup, which then tipped straight onto the keyboard.

The laptop took offense and began turning everything on at once: screen sharing, captions, and some filter that transformed Marina into a potato wearing glasses. Without blinking, her manager said, “Thank you for visualizing the team’s workload.” To stop it all, Marina yanked out the microphone, but also disconnected the docking station, and the big shared screen froze on one final frame: Plushka sitting proudly in front of the camera under the automatic caption, “Marina presents.”

Two minutes later, Marina rejoined from her phone, now without special effects and without illusions. Her manager said it had been “the liveliest quarterly update so far” and asked her to send the slides. Marina honestly sent a screenshot of the cat. Since then, the microphone has lived in a drawer, and Plushka seems to be waiting for a promotion.

Marina worked from home and took great pride in having a “workspace”: a desk, a laptop, and a ficus in the frame to suggest this was the home of a person who definitely did not eat cheese pancakes over her keyboard. That morning she had an important video meeting with a new manager, so she even put on a proper shirt. Pajama pants remained below the desk, because corporate culture also has limits.

One minute before the call, Marina noticed the ficus leaning as if it were about to personally comment on the quarterly plan. She pushed the pot farther back and caught the charging cable. The laptop switched to battery, took offense, and dimmed the screen. Marina yanked the cable back, the pot wobbled, and the ficus ceremonially spilled a little soil right onto the keyboard. At that exact moment the meeting started, the camera turned on, and Marina, being an experienced professional, pretended everything was under control. On screen she smiled silently while under the desk she held the pot with one hand and shook dirt out of the Enter key with the other.

The problem was that when Enter finally came free, it immediately sent the one thing Marina had accidentally managed to type into the chat: “ffffff.” The new manager went quiet, looked into the camera, and said he deeply related to that response to morning meetings. Everyone laughed, and Marina laughed too—slightly too sincerely, because she was still supporting the ficus with her knee.

After the meeting, the manager messaged her privately: “Thanks for the humanity. And nice plant.” Now the ficus lives on the floor, out of frame, like a coworker after a boundaries workshop. And Marina is back in her “workspace,” looking at it with respect: not every plant can take the floor so confidently in a first meeting.

Today at the office, something strange happened again. I was brewing coffee as usual when I noticed one of my notebooks actively discussing weekend plans with a pen. "I’m going to try and write a novel!" declared the notebook, while the pen seemed to glow with pride.

I watched this unusual duo, unable to suppress a smile. "Perfect! Please share with me when you finish!" I squeezed out, while melancholically eyeing my coffee mug. It felt like watching a melodrama on TV, but without the popcorn — a much-needed distraction during lunch break.

Then my colleague walked in, completely unaware of the unfolding drama. "Are you serious, the notebook is talking?" she asked, casting a puzzled glance at my habits. I just shrugged and replied, "Anything can happen in the office, especially if you haven’t had your coffee."

In the end, as the whole theatrical performance wrapped up, I mused that sometimes even notebooks know how to take a break. Or maybe it’s just the corporate culture around us that’s trying to squeeze a bit of irony into our days.

I'm sitting here with my coffee, watching one particularly earnest colleague who shows up to our daily Zoom meetings looking like he stepped out of a different century. His beard is so bushy that sometimes I wonder if he’s hiding a few rabbits in there for the winter. Every time he speaks, it sounds like his beard is in awe of its own voice, vibrating a little as if it were a magic wand.

The next day, our boss decided we all should wear these silly badges saying "I’m Here." So, there we were, the entire team, logging into Zoom in pajamas but proudly sporting these ridiculous badges on our chests. Does anyone genuinely believe that a badge on pajamas makes us slightly more professional? Might as well have shown off breakfast instead.

After a week of these meetings, my computer started beeping alarmingly whenever new participants entered. I asked it why, and it seemed to have developed an expertise in human emotions. So, here I am, sipping coffee while witnessing the office order devolve into a full-blown circus, and me just trying to cope with it all.

In the end, I realized: all we really need in this era of absurd corporate culture is to laugh while the bearded man welcomes us to the virtual world.

Today, my office chair did what I've been dreaming of for months — it just rolled off home on its own...