Click

The location of my cubicle at work is like the center/hub of the market place. My cube is right opposite to the printer, diagonally opposite to the candy jar, and on the way to the pantry (located behind the printer). Finally its also right beside the CEO's place so it's a location where upper management have their chit-chat before they enter the CEO's office. I get to hear jokes, dum remarks and just a lot of office chatter. To avoid getting distracted I generally have my headphones on so that I have some light music running. Even with the music I am generally aware of the surrounding and can respond to questions (but I pull out my headphones to avoid being rude!).

Now the best part of all this is that I face at an angle such that I do not face the incoming or the outgoing traffic of people. But in the 2.5 years I have unknowingly developed an knowledge of foot steps and the length of strides people take. My boss walks fast and take long strides with a slightly heavy foot so I know when he's walking past. It helps in making sure I have some right screens up on my monitor such that if he decides to stop by :D. A director takes short but quick strides and generally fiddling with his blackberry as he walks past. 

Now there are a lot of people walking by so I cant say I know all but ya the frequenters or the 'unique' ones. A week back I was deep in code-land where trouble was yelling on my face. I had music running in my ears to just cool down and slowly trying to retrace my way to a bug. From the corner of my eye I see a shadow of incoming guy, the foot steps sound familiar and I know who it is. It's Brain from the client services team upstairs. I know when he walks past he walks slowly, upright and doesn't turn his head. He has a notepad and a pen always in hand and is walking silently and straight. 

But... but ... but there is one key point.. he always clicks his pen. As he was approaching my mind sub-consciously waited for the click. My conscious mind started getting disturbed and I stopped and just stared at my monitor. I consciously tried to tell myself that this is just something silly in my mind. But I just could not start working until he slowly passed my desk and..."CLICK" went his pen. Ah! I smiled to myself looked at  top of Brian's head which was moving steadily past my cubicle wall.

My mind was at peace and I resumed my code jam. There are small things deep down in the sub-conscious mind that are not known even to self. Okay if that's complicated then there are things we know but we don't know that we know. Well I'm not sure how else to say it :)