With that in mind, about a year ago I bought a desk. It's an old writing desk, with sticky drawers and baize on the fold-down top that's so covered with ring marks it could double as a crop-circle blueprint. I've become very fond of it.
Because I'm a hoarder at heart, it's also covered in crap:
Just about everything there has some daft significance to me. Our engagement photo, two dolls my grandma left me, a plaster bust of Vlad Tepes given to me in Romania, several dinosaurs, a piece of glass I found in a glass-blowing factory when I was six, a bear made of blue-tack. I could tell you a boring story about every random item, if you stood still long enough.
This is a pretty tidy version of my desk, btw. There've been times when I can't get near it because it's covered in bills or books or socks. Look, there's even room for my coffee today.
In comparison, this is my husband's work desk:
He's in his second year of his nursing degree, and this is fairly indicative of how he thinks it's going, the poor lamb. His desk is pretty functional - it's covered in work, or work-related items (and also the baby monitor). His is an area for working; mine is to distract me from working.
And this is Jacob's desk:
Which is cute and teenage. The bonsai tree is called Odin.
These desks are all in the same room, btw, one in each corner, so we have the illusion of working together even though we're facing in different directions.
They also suit us as individuals. I couldn't work at Jacob's desk. For one thing, he wouldn't let me; for another I can't get out of the broken saggy office chair he insists on using. John's desk has too few distractions for my limited attention span. And I don't think anyone could work at my desk, because there's a system to be learned as to which piles can be moved and which are load-bearing to the upper layers of crap (also everyone hates my ergonomic chair).
Anyway, it's very comforting that we've got our own personal spaces. And if the work gets done, that's what matters, doesn't it?
