Extra late this week but better later than never. Anyway, this week, on Truthful Tuesday, Frank from Thoughts and Theories asks:

Do (or did) you work in a non-traditional work environment (work-at-home, travel, etc.), and do (or did) you enjoy it? If you don’t (or didn’t), do you think you would have liked the opportunity to do so?

At the moment, I only go into the office one day a week while work from home the remaining days. In the recent months, the department had been wanting us to work completely remote.

It’s not the first time I worked from home. Between 2014 and 2017, my mom and I were freelance translators. We translated the instruction manual for an education software from English to Chinese, well, mom translated, I proofread even though I didn’t know the first thing about Chinese grammar since I only studied up to 4th grade in China before immigrated to the U.S.

I mostly judged the grammar by intuition. If there was anything to be learned from preparing for college entrance exams and graduate school exams, if something sounds right, then it’s probably right.

Did I enjoy it?

Not one bit. I mean, how would you feel if your mom is your boss? Also the job was boring and it made my head hurt staring at Chinese characters all day. Those big paragraphs looked like gibberish to me. It’s why after 2017, I swore never to be a translator ever again.

When my former supervisor asked if I want to work from home late 2019, I said “no way,” thinking back to my translator days. Then the pandemic came and I was forced to face the reality of working from home. Now, almost 2 years later, I must admit, I kind of enjoying it.