What else are we supposed to do with the 25 photos that we get in the “Lifetime Memories” pack from school???
I’ve got a half dozen pictures and a personalized calendar that has family pictures on it. I love looking up and seeing my girls or all of us on vacation.
Also, photos are like a license plate for the cubicle. They let you know if you’ve taken a wrong turn.
“Whoa. That’s not my hot wife.”
One of the girls in my nun-owned-and-managed-dorm in college (who was a very, very, very Good Girl) and her bf exchanged custom-printed T-shirts of themselves naked. She had a lot of fun scandalizing the easiest-to-scandalize nuns by mentioning the shirts but not showing hers until Sister Montse chuckled and said “may I ask, at what age?”
3 months old, of course 
I once had a job where one of my tasks was getting supplies for our lab. I had to fill in a request and send it to a person in Purchasing, who then had to process it. The first time, I brought it in person since I had to go to Central anyway, to introduce myself. She had a phone call and I entertained myself looking at the pictures on her desk, of two boys at their Bar Mitzvahs (which at that point I only knew vaguely as “the Jewish confirmation” and would not have been able to spell correctly). The two boys could have passed as brothers if one picture hadn’t been an evidently-old b/w and the other one an evidently-recent color. When she finished her call, I pointed at the color picture and said “is that boy your grandson?”
American Jewish grandmas are just like a Spanish grandmas, only more likely to have a job 
I never understood people who claimed she was a bitch and liked to take forever for their requisitions on purpose, mine were always on time!
In that case, it was a mechanism for her to separate the rude from the polite and for some of us to get our requisitions on time.
I think I had pictures of Kid Kalhoun on my desk when he was a little tyke, but I’m not one for setting up my work area like home, anyway. I like to be able to split with nothing more than a shoebox. I guess that’s because I temped for so many years. Now that I work from home, I try to keep it “business only” on my desk. Kinda hard though, since I’m a bit disorganized.
I love my family; I’m proud of them too. I don’t need to show them off, but I like looking at the pictures and they look nice on the shelf above my monitor.
I reckon there are folks who use their family pictures as some sort of image fascism, but for the most part, most of us don’t put that much thought into it; we love our families and think a few pics of them in an othrwise bland cubicle looks nice. No need to overanalyze.
And if you don’t have family to show off, you can display cutsie piccies of your pets or even photos of yourself doing all the wild things that people with kids miss out on. Within reason. I mean… like kayaking up the Amazon. Yes, that’s what I meant. Somehow displaying photos of those naked all-night tequila-drinking contests might be a career-limiting move.
I work from a home office, and I have a bunch of pictures of my husband and son around. I like to look at them because to me, they are both very cute, and since I have no co-workers, it certainly isn’t showing off.
I’ve known people at work who had pictures of THEMSELVES in their cubicle/office – and not because it was a family shot that they were in along with the spouse and kids; I’m talking pictures just of them. Now that’s just plain wierd.
Oh, and I have a picture of one of my cats on my desk. I don’t really need it though, because the real thing is usually on the desk too. She is right now.
After reading these responses, that was going to be my follow-up question.
Like Kalhoun, I like to minimize personal things at work, so when they fire me, I can pick my keys and walk out the door- no embarrassing boxing up of your personal items while everyone watches
A co-worker of mine has, in addition to some family photos, an autographed picture of George W. and Laura Bush in his cube.
He first put it up shortly after 9/11, and to his credit (I guess) continues to display it now— helping to answer for me (at least in a small way) who exactly comprises that 32% of people who still approve of the President’s performance.
I have pictures of my wife and daughter all over my workspace because I find them relaxing to have around. It makes my workspace more attractive, relaxing and comfortable, and so I work better.
My office also has an ergonomically comfortable chair, lots of light with a balance of sunlight and artificial light, a tropical fish tank, fresh air, and a nice desk clock my wife gave me. It’s worth it to make your worksplace more pleasing. It reduces stress and increasing productivity. Pictures of my family are just part of that.
The value of an ergonomically and visually pleasing workspace cannot be overstated. It makes a big difference. Let me relate a story; a number of years ago my father and I ran a consulting company. We had a stable of 12-18 consultants who worked for us, all of whom worked out of their homes. We ran the firm out of my parents’ basement.
My Dad put about $50,000 of renovations (and this was 20 years ago) into the basement when setting it up as an office, in large part to make it NOT look like a basement. It was a hideously long and expensive project but the end result was beautiful; the place looked fabulous. It was bright, spacious, comfortable, had two exits, well ventilated, full facilities, lots of filing and workspace, more than enough deskroom, top quality chairs (you cannot overstate the value of a good office chair) a bathroom, a mini-kitchen, and looked like a professional’s office. It was a pleasure to work there. Clients loved to visit.
Now, one thing we found in working with independent consultants was that they tended to go through a cycle of elation and depression upon becoming independent consultants. For awhile they’d be thrilled to be making money out of their homes (well, when they weren’t working with the client) but then you’d notice them getting depressed and wanting to come over and visit us. A large part of that, I believe, was their workspaces. All of them had offices tucked away in dark, poorly lit, stuffy basements with faux-wood panelling and concrete floors. At best, they were jammed into a spare bedroom. After awhile, working in that sort of space will start to get to you. It’s dark and it’s messy and depressing.
That’s a long and marginally off topic story, but it comes back to the same thing; your workspace should be comfortable. Plants, plesant pictures, knickknacks you enjoy, maybe some fish if that’s feasible, and the basics of good office planning - lots of space, sufficient storage, and keeping it clean - all these things will make you happier, reduce your stress, and improve your work. And pictures of my little girl make my workspace a LOT nicer.
My younger brother is the program director and morning jock at the radio station where I work; he’s a Type A personality with a very high-profile and very high-stress position. The wallpaper on his computer screen is a photo of his 2-year-old daughter, taken at Thanksgiving dinner at our home last year. It is a darling photo of cherubic cheeks, impish eyes and a smile that spreads happiness for blocks. I’ve seen him go storming out of a meeting, stomp into his office and slump into his chair, take a long look at his computer screen and be transformed. We are all deeply grateful that he has that photo to keep him centered.
On the other hand, I worked for several years in a call center, and one of my co-workers, who became a good friend while we worked together, had a photo of her grandchildren on her computer screen. It was there the entire four years she worked at the center. I saw her about a year after she left, we were talking, and the subject of her grandchildren came up (imagine that!) I asked about the photo – she said she’d thrown it away because every time she looked at it, it reminded her of the call center and the awful calls we used to get.
I have hundreds of pictures of former students decorating my classroom walls. Why shouldn’t my wife get equal time?
As a lot of posters have said, it helps to remind me of what I’m working for. And that since I earn the majority of the household income, I need to not only do nothing stupid, but excel at my job so that I can move on to even higher positions that pay more. I have it to remind me of the great vacations my wife and I used to take and to give me hope that we’ll be able to travel like that again someday.
Although as a contractor that has changed jobs/cubicals very often, I have all my pictures in digital format in a digital photo frame. It cycles through them all in a slide show, and it’s easily portable if I have to vacate this cube. (Thisis the frame if anyone is interested)
I don’t have any pictures, not having a family and all, and I like to be able to vacate quickly if called upon to do so. But other people’s pictures don’t bother me. Except perhaps one guy’s: he has an at least 5x7 shot of his wife (who also works here), close up on her face, done in a studio. It’s not quite Glamor Shots but has that vibe. That’s very vaguely creepy.
Well, to put it as briefly as possible, because visual imagination and sense of sight are qualitatively different things. They are not simply different in terms of degree; they are not the same at all. “Thinking about” my wife is a fluid thing; how she looks in my mind’s eye may be a function of how she looked when last I saw her, or, more often, a composite of the many, many ways she has looked since I have known her. My mind may capture a familiar facial expression, matched to a particularly nice hairstyle; it may imagine her in motion, speaking or laughing or doing, or from a collection of angles, or even as an abstraction: my wife, who is beautiful. These are not bad things; they are wonderful things, but they stimulate the brain in one kind of way.
Actually looking at her, via the medium of a photograph, is a different kind of stimulus that produces a different kind of response.
It is nice to have both options open to me. If I want the particular kind of happiness that comes from thinking about her, I can have that; if I want the particular kind of happiness that comes from looking at her.
I mean, I’ve eaten the cream of crab soup at my favorite seafood restaurant probably a dozen times in the last year or so. I know what it tastes like. I can sit here and think about the cream of crab soup all I want, and it is enjoyable to do so. But it is not the same experience as actually tasting the soup, in the same way as thinking about my wife or daughter is not the same as actually seeing them.
Also, pictures don’t just capture a face; they capture a particular moment in time. Can I think about what my wife looked like on our wedding day? Sure. But how accurate will my imagination really be? Since that day six years ago, she’s changed her hairstyle three times, and the color of her hair has undergone subtle natural changes. She gained and lost pregnancy weight, changing the contours of her face and body. Age has changed the look of her face. And the particular expression on her face at the moment our wedding picture was taken will probably never been seen again - similar smiles, maybe, but not that exact same expression. If I glance to my right, I can see my wife exactly as she was just after 1:00PM on our wedding day, see exactly what expression she had at that moment. And photos have a context; seeing that picture triggers associations, emotions, related thoughts - the flowers showed up late that day and my mother cursed out the delivery guy in the parking lot; Shannon’s always-proper ex-military Uncle got piss-ass drunk and danced like a crazy man; the filet was good; the champagne was lousy; how beautiful my wife’s hair looked from behind when I finally saw what she had done with it. I can “think about” these things, sure, but looking at that picture brings them all to me in one quick flood, brightening my day a little, and I can get back to work a little happier than before.
This is even more pronounced with my daughter. She no longer looks anything at all like she did just a year ago, when I first taught her how to sing “It’s a Hard Knock Life” from Annie, but there’s a picture of her from right around that time sitting under my computer monitor here at work that can bring that memory back to me in half a second.
That’s why. Because seeing and imagining are not the same, and there’s a place for both.
When I worked from an office, I liked personalizing my space. Pictures of my family are just one aspect of that.
Thanks. I figured it would be something like that. You did a great job articulating it.
And I still don’t get it.
I think there might be something wrong with me. 
-FrL-
(Maybe this is the difference between me and most people: I wouldn’t say I derive any pleasure from looking at my wife, or anyone else that I am fond of. That could be taken the wrong way. But I don’t mean I don’t think she’s nice looking or whatever. I just mean I don’t think of looking at her as being a way I enjoy her as a person. This is true of my wife, my kid, and every other person I know.
But apparently, this is not how it is for most people? Most people like to look at people they are fond of? This enjoyment of looking at the person has something to do with the fondness for the person? Or something like that?)
I think most people like to look at people they’re fond of, yes. I certainly do. If you take my youngest daughter, for example, I can spend quite a lot of time admiring her hair, her cute little expressions, her mischevious grin, her eyelashes, her cheeks, the way she runs, the way she always bounces up and down (and the more excited she gets, the more she hops, until she can’t even get any words out)…I guess you get the point. Looking at a picture of her lets me enjoy that moment, that particular expression, again. It makes me happy. Other people don’t find her nearly as fascinating and beautiful as I do–she’s not gorgeous or anything–but it’s my privilege to love and admire her like that, 'cause I’m the mom and it’s my job.
Well, I’d say this is indeed unusual. Nothing wrong with it, though; whatever works for you is fine by me. I am curious, though: do you derive enjoyment out of any visual aesthetic experience? Do you derive pleasure from watching a sunset, or a particularly good painting, or what have you? What would your personal definition of the word “beautiful” entail?
Many excellent reasons have been mentioned, I wish to add one more reason.
There is something to be said for fitting in, all the other married people have pictures of there families up, it looks odd, if you are the only one who does not.
Looking around my cube, I have gone from one extreme to the other. I use to have no pictures, but just a collage as my desktop background of my family. I now have 7 pictures of my wife and kids in the cube.
A few jobs back I worked for a company where one of my coworkers was a very attractive young blonde-haired woman that looked like she could be a model. She did the strangest thing as far as pictures I have ever seen so far. She kept a picture on her desk of herself in a skimpy bikini. If I had a picture of a swimsuit model wearing the same swimsuit, HR would have told me to remove it as it was sexist. I never did figure out, why she had the picture in her cube. I am not sure if she was showing off or just somewhat ditzy about these things.
Jim
I’m one of those people: I have a picture of myself on my desk. It’s there in anticipation of when I’m still working there twenty-five years from now, and I look like someone rapidly approaching retirement age, so that my future coworkers can point at it and do a double take and ask, incredulous, “Did that used to be you?”