Back when I was just a baby fresh out of school in the working world, one who still believed that journalism was a respectable and well-paid profession, I had a mentor at work. She was a senior editor at the daily newspaper where I worked and right from my very first day I could tell she commanded a lot of respect in the newsroom. Her columns were well-read and always got lots of reader feedback, mostly positive, she got invitations to everything cool that was going on in the city, and she was one of those people whose opinions really mattered--people seemed to care about pleasing her more than even her higher-ups.

When I found out she was also a single mom, I admired her even more. Until then I'd figured she came in at 5AM and left after midnight and didn't even take breaks to eat but was just some kind of award-winning story-producing robot. She seemed to get so much done and was so accomplished professionally--knowing that she was also raising a family on her own was super impressive.

These were the days before I had a laptop, so at the end of the day, if I had something to work on in the evening, I'd save it to a disc (OK KIDS, DO YOU KNOW WHAT A DISC IS?? Holy shit, I feel like a frigging dinosaur right now) and bring it home with me. One night, this particular editor saw me packing up to head home, and she asked what I was doing that night. I waved the disc at her and mumbled something about working all night on a feature piece after I got home and had a bite to eat.

She made a face and shook her head at me. "You should just stay here until it's done," she said. "That's my rule of thumb. Never take your work home. Even if you have to be here half the night, keep your work at work and keep everything else separate."

She was totally right, and for a long time I lived by those words. It was way less convenient to bring work home, not having a laptop. And it was so nice to come home and know that even if it was 9, 10, 11 PM, I wasn't going to park myself in front of the computer for another hour or two. When I left the office, I was done.

Since then things have changed. I've had a laptop for the past five or so years and a Blackberry for the past two, so work not only comes home with me, but it goes to the grocery store, out with friends, in the car, to the bathroom. Sadly, I'm not joking. It's convenient and sometimes it's great to be able to curl up and work on a project from the couch or a coffee shop. Other times, I wish being home meant being home, relaxing, not thinking about work. I would say my mind is at least partially occupied with work at least 95% of the time and I'm guessing that's because I can't/don't ever leave it behind physically.

I wonder if times have changed for my old colleague too. I'm guessing she's all hooked up with laptops galore and probably an iPhone by now...I wonder if she has managed to leave her work at the office at the end of the day. I think her advice was fantastic and I'd like to start following it, even one night a week or one day on the weekend.

Do you prefer to get your work done AT work or elsewhere?