Desk Debauchery

I wonder if people know that one of the scariest places to venture into, aside from a new technology store or an Apple store, is a place people go to every day. They might assume the scariest place would be inside someone else’s car or a doctor’s office. Certainly, those places are all very scary. In cars, for example, you can see a person’s life. The evidence of their lunch may be on the floor by the backseat, stashed like codes to CIA files. Documents they should have put away a lifetime ago will be lingering in the glove box, performing different kinds of greetings, depending upon the person. Other treats might even leap out at you, like melted chocolate bunnies. A doctor’s office is just as scary, especially the epically bad magazines that await you. They’re enough to make anyone run far away.

But there’s a place whose fear factor greatly surpasses those others. It’s something everybody sees and uses, whether at home or in the workplace: the work desk.

On my desk is a smorgasbord of objects: headphones, pens for sighted people who always ask for them, audiobooks stacked like war trophies, a box full of cards I can’t scan into my OCR program, and a box with nothing in it but flash drives, where I back up ISO images of Microsoft Windows, CDs, and documents I want to share. And, of course, it holds the crumbs of cookies people have brought me.

For the past few weeks, I’ve been keeping everything on a flash drive. I’m someone who uses cloud storage sites way more than anyone should. Someone might ask why I use Dropbox, Evernote, Google Drive, and the like. My answer would be that when my files are in the cloud, I don’t have to worry.

Cloud storage, I’ve noticed, started popping up early in the ’00s. I joined the crowd. Who wouldn’t? If you’re any kind of writer, musician, or journalist, or in a similar profession, I think you’d need at least one service like Dropbox to back up your data without a second thought. If your computer crashes, you don’t have to worry —- the file isn’t lost.

Until this month, I’ve used Dropbox as my Web flash drive. It’s a syncing application. You download it onto two separate computers, and then whatever you keep in the Dropbox folder will sync to both devices. You can literally access this file from anywhere in the world.

Some people have even gotten into the habit of using cloud storage creatively. Businesses use it to keep their records, doctors use it to update patient notes and files, and people like me use it to quickly send stuff to editors.

Now, I know what you’re thinking: There’s email for that. That’s true, but Dropbox offers less hassle and is clutter-free. I can just invite someone to my shared folder, and they can see and interact with anything I put there. If I were to place an article in that shared folder, I wouldn’t have to email it. The editors with access to that folder would be automatically notified, and then they could click to see the file and even interact with it.

I use other apps for simultaneous collaboration, like Microsoft Office Online and Google Docs. These platforms let people update their files at the same time together.

Cloud storage can save your life —- unless you’re offline like me. Then, you need to use flash drives.

My desk looks like a hurricane hit it. I know where everything is, but a stranger (my future husband with a zesty car and a wonderful smile, for example) would have to dive into the unknown with a map, a helmet, and a flashlight. Behind the headphones is some loose change. I put it away in yet another small box. My audiobooks rest on top of a stack of open boxes. I use them to remember to review certain works or just to keep things nearby so that I won’t have to get up from my desk.

This space isn’t intimidating to me. I’ve written here, cried here, gasped at sad movies here, and flirted here. I know every inch of this desk. So, now that I need a flash drive, my hand rises from the keyboard and flits to a familiar box just diagonal to my monitor. It holds my library cards and flash drives. My hand dips into the sea of portable drives and grazes over several that feel familiar, but they’re not the one I’m looking for. Then, my fingers touch a Kingston drive and a Triton drive. Both have ISO images burned into them. One image is a copy of Windows 7, which I’ll keep until I’m forced to upgrade, and the other’s a copy of Microsoft Office, just in case I tire of open-source software. I don’t expect to, but it’s always good to have options. These backups let me be ready for anything in the land of binary code.

The flash drive I want, however, isn’t here. I’ve been working from it since I went offline. It contains the articles I’m writing for various publications and even some documents I can’t back up with Evernote. I keep everything on the drive because I juggle computers throughout the day. Other flash drives have slightly older copies of files, but today, I can’t find them either.

My hand pats the drives in the box. In case I’m having a memory problem, I slip the portable devices into the USB port and check them anyway. They have music, YouTube videos, and ISO image files, but none have any documents at all. I don’t see any of my projects on these drives. I look at my computer again. The red X indicating no wireless connection seems to mock me. “Haha,” it says, “I’m blocking you from backing up your files!”

I’m obsessive about backups. Even though I save documents every few minutes with the auto-save feature in LibreOffice, I also set the application to save every minute to my flash drive —- the drive that’s missing.

Frantically, I open Firefox and type “Dropbox.com.” I get an error message. I don’t know why, but I keep trying to go to the website. I want to see my revision history! When one tantrum ends, I have another as my hand plunges into my box of drives. I fling them all about as I feel again for the one drive I need.

Oh, no! I think, wildly. What if someone took it and read what I had written? I’m especially concerned about my bank information. Oh, my god! Oh. My. God!

I clutch the box before flinging it onto my bed. I toss the drives aside as if they’re deadly. Now that they’re scattered on my bright orange comforter, I undertake a tactile examination of each drive. For good measure, I race to the computer and stick them all the ports at the same time. Still, none of them have what I’m looking for. Oh! My! God!

Without Dropbox, I hadn’t realized how conscientious I had to be about saving my files. As I’ve said before, the internet has made my brain complacent in some ways.

Soon, I flop to the floor as if I’m in a war and the troops are rounding the hill. I crawl on my hands and knees, patting my carpet like a totally blind toddler exploring his new home. I don’t care how stereotypical I look, patting the floor like I have a new puppy nobody else can see. I gotta find that flash drive.

The hunt is on. My hands and feet move about the apartment, patting in search of the missing drive. I throw away trash, and I even look under the bed. I toss out some old papers that were covering a bunch of audiobooks I need to send back to the library. I clear some dust from under my bed as I move some boxes and a backpack out from underneath. I search under everything, pat under everything. I don’t feel anything resembling the missing flash drive. Dashing over to my sink, I toss some old advertisements out, and I gawk when I still don’t feel the flash drive anywhere.

I know I’m panicking, especially since my apartment isn’t big. I can clean every inch of it in ten minutes, but still, there’s no sign of my quarry.

My cleaning spree/scavenger hunt takes me through the entire apartment, even to the corner of my closet. When I’m done cleaning, I call someone with perfect vision to aid me.

“Hi,” I squawk as soon as one of the other young residents picks up.

“Hello.” His voice suggests I might be too much to deal with right now. Or maybe he was about to take a nap.

“Can you come over here? This is urgent! I’ve lost my flash drive, and, well, I want to use your vision since mine sucks.”

“Will do! Be there in a few,” he says.

I tap my foot as I wait. I search yet again, but still, I can’t find anything. When I hear a knock, I spring up to fling the door open, nearly knocking my neighbor off his feet.

“Oh, thank you,” I cry. Slapping my thigh emphatically, my fingers brush against something in my pocket. I freeze.

“So, I see you’ve already looked in your apartment. Are you sure you’ve lost it?”

“No,” I say softly.

“Really? Neat! It sounds like you found it. Where was it?”

“Right here.” I hold up the drive. It’s been in my pocket this entire time.