I left corporate America for the blissful freedom of self-employment several years ago. Prior to this point, I had spent years working with startup companies, living in cubicles and hijacked conference room spaces... I was at the point in my career where an office with a door was almost a guarantee.

Ahh...the office with a door....

But then, I went into consulting. As a traveling "Big 5" consulant, I traded my office dream for the hope of first class upgrades (more laptop space to work within), shared offices and desk spaces, borrowed client cubicles and - of course - hijacked conference room space.

It was a noisy and distracting existence.

Today, I've got my spacious office, with a door. I can have a happy dog at my feet (if I want) - even a baby and some toys (if I want). Yay!

Well, I was celebrating, until I expanded my involvement in social networks, joining Facebook, Twitter and Plurk among others. Now, I seem to be back in a noisy cubicle again. I'm being plurked and tweeted, IM'd, DM'd and friended by people I don't know, filtering out conversations I don't have time for, people are writing on my wall and sending me links to things I must read.

The funny thing is, I don't even have that many friends or followers. I used to want more. But after my recent mprofs article, in which I invited people to follow me on Plurk and Twitter -- perhaps I should reconsider. There's joy in being a neatly kept secret...in managing one's conversation streams.

For now, I find myself again working in a noisy and distracting existence. Part fun - part frustration - part vortex. It's easy to feel like there's no door - but truth be told, there is. It's called "EXIT"... but my desire to do that with each application is proportionate to my fear that I'll be missing out of the discussion, in some way (good and bad). Maybe I'll get over that soon and disconnect a bit.