My wallpaper and I are fighting a duel to the death. One or the other of us has to go. 
As Oscar Wilde found out, the wallpaper usually wins.
I am being moved to a 'new' office.  After having been in the same location for seven or eight years.  (I'm really not sure.)  The wallpaper will not be missed.  My little camera can not do its ugliness justice.  But the office itself?  The very fact that I find it unsettling to move most likely means that it is time to move on.  My first real job in twenty-five or so years and I find myself in my own office with a private bathroom.  Not bad.  And now it's time to let it go.

I don't like the bathroom. It is oppressively dark - tiled with horrible 1970's teal plastic tiles.  And kind of a lower ceiling that disturbs anyone prone to claustrophodia. Yech.   And it truly became oppressive when the light burned out and the maintenance man made a mental note to pick up a new one at Home Depot.  But he hasn't and we all have bigger fish to fry, so to speak.  So I haven't asked again.  Why pursue a light bulb for a room you can't stand to be in.  But the bathroom has it's purpose - besides the fact that I can store odds and ends in the shower.  It's nice to know that I have an office with a private bathroom.

I remember sitting in my office over twenty years ago, while meeting with the priest who was instructing us in the Catholic faith.  From time to time I think about that.  How I was sitting in a room
that would one day be my office, my refuge and maybe just a little bit my prison.  But mostly my home away from home.  I must be honest and confess the pleasure I find in leaving my house - with the mess and the noise and the dogs - five days a week and walking into another home that is clean and serene.  When I worked nights in the rectory office, I took great satisfaction in knowing that I could walk the length of the building, from front office to kitchen, in the dark and not trip or slip on anything.  Home does not offer this opportunity.  I am way too attached to this other home.  So moving is good.

We're going to new building; my office may become a bedroom or office for a new priest coming to our parish. Getting everything packed while performing my basic tasks will be a challenge.  I'm tripping over boxes and I have two big bags of recyclables to go to the dumpster on Tuesday. When the dumpster is emptied. It would be nice to have one of those dumpster that are put directly under a window; joyfully chucking all the extraneous papers that have built up. Repeat after me:  The bulky catalog of religious goods - and there is a lot of redundancy among the various vendors - is a catalog we don't have to carry to another building.

If only the move could happen a bit faster, rather than over the course of several weeks.  Like pulling off a Band-Aid, it would be easier to not prolong the pain.  Just a quick, sharp separation.  Maybe I'll look over my shoulder, the way Mary Tyler Moore did when she left the newsroom on the last episode of her show.  We won't need to stand in a huddle singing "It's A Long Way to Tipperary";  we're only going down the block for crying out loud.   Gotta go.  It's time.

And I hope they splurge and change the wallpaper.