Cannot work without my head in a vise
In college, I got some old audiophile headphones from my dad which I used to wear everywhere. I think they were from the 1990s... they were over-ear, and they had a curly cord, like an old phone cord... they might have been by Sony? I got used to working with them plugged into my laptop in the library.
When I graduated and entered the workforce, my employer also provided me with a pair of large, comfy, over-ear headphones at my desk in the office. The ritual of starting work in the morning required, as an essential component, the ritual of closing myself off from the world with these gigantic headphones.
About a year into my first job, I realized that I could not work without the headphones. I needed the ear covering and the pressure on the sides of my head to put myself into "work mode." I'd gotten so used to it over the years that I felt I physically required it in the same way one might require coffee. Working without headphones on felt naked. Taking them off my head to have a conversation with someone was almost as valuable as a coffee break in its ability to sever and refresh my thoughts.
I found this terrifying. Generally, I find dependence on anything to be pretty alarming, when I first notice it. I wondered what might happen if for some reason I was unable to get headphones. Would my work quality take a dive? What if I forgot headphones at home or something and found myself completely head empty at an important work event?!
I got over that worry. It turns out that it's pretty easy for me to ensure that I have big ass headphones on my head every day between 10 and 6. I have, in the past, even worn big ass headphones that do not even work, just to get the head pressure and the ear-covering in play.
During 2020 and 2021, when I was getting used to prolonged WFH, I had a single pair of big computer headphones which I would move between my work computer and my personal computer at the end of the day, as part of a ritual to prevent myself from staying at my work computer too late, or using my personal computer too early. The headphones were just as essential to work as the computer itself.
I now have some wireless headphones. I waited much longer than most of my peers to get a pair of wireless headphones because they seemed a bit wasteful to me. The idea of it was almost confusing - wasn't the point to be tethered to my machine? To me, the big over-ear computer headphone seemed like a computer mouse - part of the apparatus of the sit-down desktop computer and the various physical practices required for its use. It's taken me quite a while to get over that idea. I still find it weird to get up from my computer with the headphones on.
I expect to keep this pair of headphones as long as I possibly can. I used that old pair of headphones from college even after they broke, just for the somatic work mode trigger that sticking them onto my head provided me. These wireless ones will not last as long - nothing with a battery does - but they will remain useful in some respect as long as they can cover my ears.