Goodbye Ghost Fly

Inevitably we would leave the Camino PR starter office.

Our basement office was once a stable for the work-horses that carted baked goods through Manhattan.   In the first weeks we hauled out debris and installed large bamboo mats and oversized desks to create a comfortable but frugal workspace.   We sanitized everything, but still I was so convinced that rats and roaches would make their appearance that my mother shipped us a diaper-genie type trash can that tightly  seals any evidence of food.  I was wrong to be afraid, only two living creatures emerged: a horse fly that periodically buzzed through the office like a Blue Angel air show, and a gigantic wasp that spontaneously reproduced and then flew away.  I don’t know why the wasp visited, but I believe our supersize fly held the spirit of horse flies past, reminding us to recognize those things upon which we build our future.

Our carriage house was the kind of office where you could sketch on the wall and spill paint on the floor.  One day Woody Allen and Larry David showed up and turned the carriage house into a temporary movie  set.  Many Tuesdays we ended the day with creative hour, when Tomas and Sean would practice guitar and Mary would bring in a bag of sweets from the Donut Pub.

But there were downsides too.  It’s the kind of office that makes you worried about getting your nice suit dusty from crumbling pillars.  The air was stale and smelled vaguely of horses, despite our abundance of aromatherapy and the constant whir of the air purifier.  The original window and door could not be sealed, and on frigid days the narrow stone stairwell created a wind tunnel that swept directly into our meeting area.   Cell phones sputtered as if we were in a bunker and every evening we wrapped our computers in colorful silk scarves to prevent them from taking in too much dust.

“We aren’t a typical corporate office” Loretta often says, words I soothe myself with when we are doing other-duties-as-assigned like pouring animal-friendly salt on the icy stone steps.   I have known many lovely typical corporate offices but we’ll always be a little quirky, like our carriage house roots.  We have moved just two  blocks.   We now work on the floors above a poster store that houses the largest collection of movie posters in the world.   Oversized double doors in our top floor open onto a large wooden deck that gives us a rooftop view of Chelsea.

After working hard underground we are taking in deep breaths of  fresh air.  I am grateful for our roots and for the friends who give us momentum.  Goodbye first Camino home.  Thank you and goodbye, ghost fly.