Working at Home

Occasionally I am asked how I manage to be disciplined enough to work at home. Many people who have their own businesses work at home and are very successful at it. Their experience is probably similar to mine. It requires having a different set of work habits. I learned how to do it from my husband.
I had a perfect model of how to work at home when my husband set up his own public relations business in 1982. This was a time when it wasn’t fashionable to be telecommuting, but in our case, it was the consequence of necessity. Because of various circumstances in the business world, my husband found himself unemployed after more than thirty years as a public relations consultant with a large firm. Rather than becoming involved in a battle about age discrimination, we opened Phil Richman Associates in the downstairs study of our house.
Neither of us knew how to use a computer. Nevertheless, we bought an early portable computer manufactured by the Osbourn Company and my husband proceeded to learn how to use it. The computer made it possible for him to start the business without an office or a secretary. All he needed was a phone line, a fax machine, the computer, and a very disciplined work ethic.
He began with one client who believed in his talent and ability to do a good job of getting publicity for products and people. He decided that the business would not move out of our house because he enjoyed working at home. Our study was designated “the office” and it was no longer used for any other function besides the business. Not having to get dressed up in a suit and tie every day was a real benefit to this new arrangement. Occasionally there might be a need for an office downtown in order to meet potential new clients. One of his friends who had office space allowed him to use it for meetings in return for public relations counsel. It worked to both of their advantage.
Although he didn’t leave the house for his job, my husband made a clear separation between his working hours and his home hours. He established a firm rule of getting dressed every day, eating breakfast, and then going into his office to work. He would take a lunch break, and then spend the rest of the afternoon continuing his work until I came home from my studio. There was an advantage to being at home in that he could take off work early whenever he wished. And, he didn’t have to work nights and weekends unless something pressing was going on. The most important thing he did was to take his business seriously and use his time productively in order to do the best possible job for his clients. He was able to continue this business until he died sixteen years later.
My studio was not in our house. It was important for me to separate my art working space from our living space because the work I was doing required solvents that are not advisable for home use. I needed space to work and display my paintings.
After my husband died I moved into several rooms in my house and these became my studio. It was a huge change for me. The space is a lot smaller and it is broken up. The most important change was learning to create the separation between being at home, and going to work. My husband did it so easily, but I find it hard to follow his good example.
I am often tempted to paint in my bathrobe. There are times when I think of some thing I need to do to a painting just before going to bed and then I may be up working until quite late at night. If I impulsively begin to paint while wearing good clothes, they become spotted with paint. Once in a while I may have plans to watch a TV program at a certain time and I miss it because I’ve stopped to work a bit before the program begins. Or, I am about to go to a concert and I stop for a minute to take a look at what I have done, and I forget and start working. Then I have to race out of the house in order to get there on time.
It is hard for me to eat breakfast and go to work the way he did. Phone calls from friends are more interesting than trying to work on a painting, especially when I am at a beginning stage or one that is giving me problems. There are household chores that need to be done so I do that in stead of going to work. Being in my house is also very lonely. Previously, in my studio I had access to other artists who also had studios in the building. Now I have to make an effort to meet friends for lunch or coffee. I’m not as involved in the art community as I had been.
In order to get myself into the frame of mind that makes me use my studio productively, I have to remind myself that this is my studio and my work comes before doing the laundry. I invented some routines that help make the separation between home and studio possible. For one thing, every morning I make a bag lunch for myself, as I had done when I had a studio away from home. I don’t take any coffee breaks because once I begin working I want to continue without interruptions.
I moved my computer into one of my studio rooms so I could quickly scan images into it and use that information for the paintings I am working on. I also need the computer because I have several web sites that I manage. The most difficult problem I run into is allocating time for the two different kinds of work. And I try to have regular working hours and leave the household stuff for the weekend. I realize now that the benefits of working at home far outweigh those of having a separate studio. It has taken me quite a while to adjust, but now that I am used to this arrangement, I wouldn’t trade it for the world.