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Appreciate yourself
By juliezavala in My Turn
October 7, 2011

Image A potted mum for my desk.

Today I cleaned and organized my desk at work. It was a long overdue task that I had been putting off. Too busy to straighten things up, I had accumulated piles of paper covering the space around my keyboard. After sorting and then tossing most of the paper into the recycle bin, I discovered a some dust, food crumbs and a few coffee stains as well. I was officially a slob.

Armed with some Clorox Wipes I attacked the desk, wiped down my phone and dusted off the book shelves. Pretty soon things were looking better and certainly more sanitary.

At lunch I went to WalMart and bought one of those air fresheners that spray a scent when you move past it -- some sort of motion detector in it; genius.

I was pushing my cart past the makeup section when I saw a large display of potted mums in the center aisle. Usually I would roll right past the flowers thinking they were an extravagance, but something stopped me. I thought about how nice it would be to see those lovely gold and rust colored flowers sitting on my newly cleaned desk. I put one of the mums in my basket.

Before I moved away from the flowers an old gentleman heading down the aisle on one of the WalMart scooters said, "Hey Lady, thanks for the flowers. You shouldn't have!" I was tongue tied. My first thought was my Dad always used to call me 'Lady'. I finally said something like, "Well Sir, you're worth it!" and we both laughed.

When I got back to work I put the flowers on my desk. Their light scent and autumn colors put a smile on my face and I glanced at them often throughout the rest of the day, appreciating how they brightened my work area.

It's so easy to get caught up in our day-to-day grind. Often, we take ourselves for granted and don't show ourselves the appreciation we deserve. A clean desk, an air freshener, a potted mum. Simple things that can freshen up a work place and change a person's attitude for the better. All that for about twelve bucks and a little elbow grease. Priceless!