A colleague with whom I’m friendly who is based in our San Francisco office is here for the next two weeks. She’s originally from Queens and is back in town because her mother had surgery, and she wanted to be here to help take care of her during this time. We took a walk together today around Madison Square Park, talking about our experiences at the company, how we chose to switch coasts (I’ve now been here just over ten years, and she’s been in San Francisco for over eleven now), and how it’s hard for both of us to realistically consider moving back to our original hometowns. It was a funny conversation because we’re both fairly direct yet fun-loving people, and we both, as Asian women, do not at all fit into the stereotypically passive Asian stereotype mold that people might assume of us. She swears a lot; I make frank comments about situations that surprise people. Neither of us is afraid to say what’s wrong in any given situation, even if it means annoying someone else in our presence. A lot of the times, it ends up being comical, but it’s nevertheless always a little shocking for some in the room who do not know us very well.

Later on, at the going-away happy hour of our colleague based here, she was exclaiming, “Yvonne, you’re so New York! You’re way more New York than I am now!” I guess I kind of am. I’m much more impatient now than I was ten years ago. In conversations around people with whom I feel comfortable, I try to be more direct and less beat-around-the-bush because I don’t want to waste time. I don’t really want to keep people guessing (except the times when I do… but that’s another story for another day). I’ve always been a fast walker, even in San Francisco, so that was easy to get used to here. I also said that I can’t stand delusional people who cannot accept and deal with reality… which is definitely not something a typical sunny Californian person would say.

You have to handle the truth. It’s part of survival, right? New York makes people a bit harder, which I’d like to think makes you fitter for survival.

Our team’s manager was in town this week, so he took us out for a team dinner tonight. We ate at an izakaya and shared many small plates, reveling in how lucky we were to live in a city with as plentiful of dining options across all cuisines as New York City. Given that we were sharing and the nature of what an izakaya was, I was quietly thankful, being the one ordering all the food, that we had no one with any food allergies or picky food inclinations at our table. Whenever food is a topic, people on my team and in our office tend to look to me for advice and suggestions. And it’s flattering when not only they ask my advice, but they actually follow through and try the different dishes or restaurants and find that they enjoyed their experiences.

“I think our team out here in New York is so great because it’s like every single one of you has a passion that is really obvious,” my manager said. He motioned to one of my colleagues and mentioned how into animals she is (she has a puppy she adopted from a local shelter), another colleague who is obsessed with sailing and has a goal of owning his own boat (and is obsessed with the band Phish, and then of course me, who is clearly passionate about food and travel.

Knowing what you are passionate about, what you deeply care about, is really important in life… especially if you are at my age, in your late twenties or early thirties. I kind of think that by this age, you really should have some idea of what you love. It gives your life meaning, direction, a sense of purpose. Otherwise, what are you doing — are you really living, or are you just existing and watching your life pass you by? It’s like this article I read recently about the most resilient people who are able to overcome massive life obstacles — the death of a parent at a young age, the sudden death of a spouse, a near-death car accident, etc.; the way that they got through these difficult life circumstances was by continuing to do what they were passionate about and loved, whether it was a hobby like sewing or painting or singing, or by volunteering and giving back to their communities if that was their thing. If you don’t have any of those things to fall back on, then what really is the point of living?

Oddly enough, my manager said that when he’s been asked what he’s passionate about, he cannot answer the question in a straightforward way and is still struggling to answer it. It sounds like he needs to do more soul searching, as well.

I was finally allowed access back to the office today as our office manager is overseeing asbestos testing in the office after the city has given its approval that there’s supposedly no asbestos that’s leaked into our HVAC system. I went in to retrieve my work laptop before heading over to a shared space that we rented for the day. We won’t know for sure that there’s no asbestos contamination inside our office walls until tomorrow morning.

During midday, a number of us in the shared rented space and those brave enough to work in the office met up to get bubble tea from Boba Guys, and it felt really comforting to be in the presence of my colleagues after nearly a week of not seeing each other. Unfortunately, one of my colleagues will be leaving us soon to join another organization, and it made me feel a little nostalgic for what once was: an organization where everyone seemed really committed not just to the cause, but to each other. The more our personnel changes, the more our culture will change, which leaves a big question mark when it comes to what this office culture is going to evolve into. Is it going to be a happy place to come to work every day, or are we just going to become a corporate machine in an attempt to be more of the “enterprise business” that our CEO wants us to become?

So I’ve been working from home the last two days due to a massive steam pipe explosion that occurred just two blocks from my office in the Flatiron district downtown in Manhattan. Generally, these explosions have happened throughout the city due to ridiculously old infrastructure that the city is too cheap or careless to deal with, and every now and then, there have been fatalities and injuries. The city seems happier to deal with these fatalities and injuries in payouts than they are to prevent them in the first place. If you think about it, it’s actually the way our healthcare system is: it’s happier to deal with you being sick (and taking you for everything you are worth because healthcare here is the most expensive in the world) than it is to prevent you from getting sick in the first place. Luckily this time, no one was killed, though a few people did suffer some minor injuries.

Based on discussions with our office manager, who has been in contact with our building’s super, who of course has been in contact with city officials, we’ve learned that it’s very much in the air as to when we will actually be able to regain access to the building. The city blocked off entry into the general area due to potential asbestos contamination. I was sulky because I actually do not enjoy working from home and prefer to be in the office. I like the camaraderie at work, the free air conditioning, and my free lunch. I also miss my work computer, which I stupidly left in the office on Wednesday night.

But the scariest part when I think about it is how old the infrastructure is in this entire city, and how many old buildings that are not up to code are being inhabited all over this island, all over these five boroughs. An incident like this one could happen pretty much anywhere, and we all know this will not be the last. Chris always says that the biggest irony of our being required to have renter’s insurance in our building (which is only two years old now) is that we’re far safer and less likely to have a disaster happen here than in our old Upper East Side co-op apartment, which is far, far older, creakier, and who knows when it was ever last inspected for safety? And we never had renter’s insurance at the last place.

We just have to hope for the best.

Today, a semi-new colleague who works remotely from South Carolina was in the office, so I suggested that we take a walk and catch up. Based on the few chats I’ve had with him and observing him when he’s been in the office, I can tell that he’s not quite at ease with his job responsibilities or his place in the company yet. He’s still adjusting to new processes and of course, learning our technology, which certainly can be a challenge. He’s also still trying to find his social niche here, particularly given that he’s a remote employee and doesn’t have a lot of face time with any of us. We spent most of our half hour talking about non-work related things, which I purposely constructed. So I told him about observations and experiences I had during my recent India trip, and he talked about the adjustment of his college- and post-college age children moving out, adjusting to adult and work life, and living a bi-state life (they go between New Jersey, where they’re originally from and have relatives, and South Carolina, which is their primary residence). “It’s nice to have a conversation not about work at work!” he exclaimed to me, smiling. It was clear he doesn’t really talk about non-work related topics with other people here.

It’s almost been like an unspoken role of mine, to make people feel comfortable here and at ease. I don’t even know how that’s really happened. I don’t know if it’s just part of my aura, or the questions that I ask or the efforts I make to talk to people, but it’s just kind of become part of my de factor non-job responsibility here. “You make people feel comfortable with your presence,” a colleague in this office recently said to me. “You keep things calm and organized.”

The more I think about it, though, the more it seems like additional pressure on me. It also seems like a bit of a gender role if I want to start digging deeper into this because what man has ever been told that he has a calming presence that puts people at ease?