The Black Hole

Monday was dismal. Cynthia and Gernard were gone. Clif had taken the week off. And another staff member was out. This left Idalia, Dean and I. We have been juggling our schedules so we can continue to help our friends in India and keep our sanity. Idalia is in her office. Behind her is the office that is Clif's alone, when he comes in. :-) It used to have Russ and Dan, too. They both left and Cynthia moved in. Now she is gone. So Idalia has a black hole behind her. She is smiling because I am being silly. We all feel these black holes

You wouldn't have believed that office with Cynthia in it. Her house must be amazing. Because her office had more decoration in a square foot than I have in my whole house. Clif will be very lonely when he returns. I sit in the office next to Idalia. This is my view when I look that way. On the other side of my office is the view that has been removed. Fred used to sit in that red chair, imparting his knowledge and friendship. Gernard sat in the chair on the left, but moved further left when Nigel left. For now, this is empty space, too It is so empty, the picture has been removed. May as well be. No reason to show a picture of a space where nobody sits.

This space on the left used to have Hao and Nigel in it. As I said, when Nigel left, Gernard took his desk on the right of this picture. We hate light in our offices. Most of the offices are left with only lights from the computers and the spot lights under the bins. We love it. It looks like we are gone and that's fine with me. But when Gernard was sitting in that chair and Hao had gone to Tech Support and the desk to the right of him was empty, this space was dead still. He was the quietest person I know. So although I miss his sweet-self, I can look over there and still imagine that he is sitting there.

For now, there are black holes to the left of us, black holes to the right. We stay focused on our goal - - retirement in 100 days. Or whatever happens in between.