Headline, February 01 2021/ ''' '' DESK STUDENTS DEAR '' ''' : ESSAY

''' '' DESK STUDENTS

 DEAR '' ''' : ESSAY

WORKING FROM BED IS A TIME-HONORED TRADITION upheld by some of history's most accomplished figures. Frida Kohal painted masterpieces from her canopy bed.

Winston Churchill, a notorious late riser even during World War II, dictated to typists while breakfasting in bed. Edith Wharton, William Wordsworth and Marcel Prosut drafter prose and verse from their beds.

''I am a completely horizontal author,'' Trueman Capote told The Paris Review in 1957, ''I can't think unless I'm lying down.''

Along, with fueling creative thinking, the bedroom can be a refuge from the chaos of home life. Parents retreat their to hide from their homebound children. Others are fleeing roommates.

''I think one of the things we're learning is that we're all in tight places, figuratively and literally. Especially if you have a roommate or spouse, there just isn't enough real estate in your home to have the privacy to get your work done,'' said Sam Stephens, 35, a singer and songwriter.

IS working from your bed a way to fuel creativity or a sign of malaise? Or both? For years, sleep experts have held one piece of common wisdom above all else : that devices have no place in the bedroom.

Yet since the pandemic began in March, millions of people have defied that guidance and begun working precisely where they sleep. They are drafting legal documents, producing events, holding client calls, coding, emailing, studying and writing, all from under the covers.

This wasn't always the plan. Early on, many of them invested in desks and other equipment meant to make their homes as ergonomically sound and office-like possible.

When New York City shut down in March, Vanessa Anderson, 24, set up a small desk in in her living room.

She was working for an agency that manages private chefs and wanted to keep some semblance of separation between work and sleep. ''For a while I was really committed to not working from my bedroom at all,'' she said.

In May, Ms. Anderson moved her desk into her bedroom for more light. ''My bed was just sitting there., taunting me,'' she said. She set ground rules for herself. She'd get in bed only after 2 p.m., but that start time shifted earlier and earlier. Come July, her bed had become her full-time office.

Ms. Anderson has since switched jobs - she works in e-commerce for a spice shop - and works remotely only part of the week, but still from her bed. Talking to others she's discovered how commonplace the practice is. ''I've been on calls with people where we were both in bed,'' she said.

At the end of the call it's like, 'How is the pandemic going? Oh, you're in bed right now too? So am I!' ''

Liz Fossilin, 33, an author ''No Hard Feelings,'' a book about how emotions affect work, takes her computer into bed with her every morning., wireless mouse and all. ''I use my mattress as a mouse pad,'' she said. Her advice to anyone doing the same these days :

''Don't beat yourself up for it. It is easy to be like, 'Ugh I'm in my pajamas. I haven't washed my hair, what am I doing,'' but it's really about the quality of your output.''

A primary argument about using devices in bed is that it can further erode the boundaries between work and home and disrupt your sleep cycle. But even Arianna Huffington, the media executive turned sleep evangelist, has found herself working from bed since the pandemic hit.

''I think it works great for people, but it's critical to have certain boundaries,'' she said. Ms. Huffington suggests keeping your night stand clear of clutter and ensuring that you have a hard stop on work hours where you get out of bed and store your electronics in another room.

So, while some people turn on computerized backgrounds to avoid revealing their bedroom workstations on video calls, others have embraced their cozy surroundings. Ms. Stephens, for one, said she described the wall behind her bed with children's artwork to make a more engaging background for her Instagram Live Performances.

Proponents of desk culture have argued that there's no way someone can be productive from bed.

''I don't know anyone who works actually in a prone position, but I know tons of people who work in bed. I think they're all a bunch of lazy, bed-sore prone, rapidly deteriorating slobs,'' the writer Susan Orlean told The New republican 2013,

Or ''maybe they're much, much happier [ and smarter] than the rest of us.''

The Honor and Serving of the Latest Global Operational Research on Times & Tides, continues. The World Students Society thanks author Taylor Lorenz.

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