I guess it won’t surprise you to learn that I picked my current house plan for the office space that it provided. I telecommute, and the Hiline Home 2152 offers a 14 by 16 office space, that’s separate from the rest of the living space, but still pretty close to the bathroom and the kitchen. The office was the first room that I moved into. I have a desk that’s a basic triangle, but it has 8 foot along one side and 6 foot along the wall, a very generous space. I have 8 book cases (6 shelves each) alongside the walls, and each of these are 6 foot tall. I have other desks/bookcase arrangements that hold my electronics, my computer equipment and I have a lot of equipment.  Servers, 4 printers, 2 laptops, 2 scanners, a few hard drives, several speakers, camera equipment. What can I say, I’m a geek, and true geeks buy equipment. There’s even room for a generous recliner, where I might work on my laptop when I’m in the mood or when my back hurts. When I’m done for the day or the night, I just close the double doors, and leave my work space as it is, without worrying about straightening up if I don’t want to. While my office is big, I use all this space. I work long hours, I study all the time, I take on-line classes. I’ve got lots of books and special single purpose equipment. I need this space. All this space.
So when Steve moved in, somehow it never occurred to me that he might want some office space. When it did strike me that he might have a paper or two that he might want to file, I cleared 2 shelves off of one of my bookcases. That went on for a while. Then when we started moving his furniture in, he mentioned that he might need a space to put his desk and file cabinet. That’s when I began thinking. I immediately shut down any idea of him moving into my office space. My true colors were showing. I’m just a terrible person.  It was unthinkable to share this valuable space that I had carved out for myself. It wasn’t happening. What was I going to do? We had 2 spare bedrooms, but one we used as a guest bedroom and it was already pretty crowded with junk that I needed to get rid. The other room I was thinking of using as a craft room one day. And anyway, Steve is the kind of guy that likes to be around people, or at least around me. He would prefer to be somewhere in close proximity to me and the dogs. I couldn’t see him going off to a bedroom, staying in there and getting anything accomplished. If he needs man cave time, he goes to the garage, goes to work on his boat, or one of his cars. So where would we put his office space?
If you look at the 2152, you’ll notice that there is a dining room to the left, right after the office. We don’t have a dining room table. We’re not all that formal. We use the dining room to store our sideboards (which are useful to hold food when we entertain), hang our pictures (there is such high walls in there), and store our fine dishes, wine, liquor and plants. We also use it as a walk through area to the kitchen. We store things we’re not using in the dining room.  The dining room doesn’t appear to really have a function of it’s own.Â
I’ve also felt that the doorway leading from the dining room into the kitchen was wasted space, at least from the kitchen’s standpoint.  I don’t have enough storage space in the kitchen and that open doorway could hold a lot of cabinets, maybe even enlarge the pantry area from the small closet into something more substantial. I don’t have the time nor the money right now to do a redesign of the kitchen, but we could test that theory now, by closing off that entry way with a shrunk I have in the dining room, and putting Steve’s desk and file cabinet against the wall in the dining room with the window. Locate a small tv right there on his desk, maybe a stereo, and he’d have room to work and relax. I think I’ll move some things around the next week or two, and see how that concept works out.Â
