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When you get fairly comfortable in a job, especially if you have your own workplace, it’s not unusual for some of your personal effects to become scattered around. At the beginning it might just be your mug, but over time your own trinkets and jackets, a spare pair of shoes and various items might become part of your working space.

There’s nothing inherently wrong with this, and it likely makes you feel more at home and comfortable doing your job. After all, if you feel settled and comfortable somewhere, you’re quite likely to enjoy what you’re doing that bit more. So as long as they’re not overwhelming or left in a mess, there’s no reason to not have a few of your personal effects in your working area.

The teacher in this story had at one time used a backpack from home to transport some objects to work, and when tidying up had left the backpack in a shared closet until such a time that it could be easily taken home. However, it was never a priority, meaning that it stayed in the closet for a year – so long in fact, that someone picked it up and started using it as their own.

Read on to find out what happened next.

AITA for taking my backpack back after a coworker used it, leaving their belongings on a chair and not telling them?

I had a backpack hanging in that cramped closet/workspace in my department corridor for a school year (August/ September). It was just hanging there. Many times I wanted to take it back home, but I simply forgot.

It was used for storage, but sometimes coworkers would work there. The cleaning staff had put some of their cleaning things in the closet as well. Other coworkers had their things in that place too.

At the beginning of May, a different room was cleared out for renovations, so they put a lot of stuff in that closet. When that happened, I finally thought about taking the backpack with me.

But the backpack is gone.

Let’s see what happened when this person tried to locate their backpack.

I put out a call in the group chat because I thought someone on my team might have taken it. No response.

Today, I went into that same closet/workspace to put something there. And what do I see there? My backpack, with all sorts of stuff belonging to someone else.

I’d left a unique keychain inside so that I could identify it, and it was still there. So I took those items out, and left them together in a neat pile in the same place as the backpack, and took the backpack home. It belonged to me so I thought, why not.

At this point, I had no clue who the items that were in the backpack belonged to. Nothing had a name or any indication that could point me to the owner of the items.

But that action didn’t go down well with the person who the backpack belonged to.

Later on, a colleague sent a message in our group chat asking who knew about it. It turned out that one of the cleaners had taken the backpack in to use. The fact that it hung in that spot for a long time isn’t really a reason for me to appropriate the thing without asking around.

Then I got a message, saying, “I would like to let you know that I did not find the way you acted today to be polite at all.”

“I found that backpack on the coat rack, where it had been hanging for a very long time. As far as I could see, no one was using it. I didn’t take it because I wanted to keep it for myself. My own backpack had broken, so I used this one temporarily.”

“Moreover, I simply took it to school every day, where everyone could see it. If it had been my intention to steal it, I certainly wouldn’t have taken it openly every day.”

And this person’s message continued.

“If the backpack was yours and you wanted it back, you could have just come to me to say so. I would have given it back to you immediately, without any discussion. Instead, you took the backpack without saying anything to me and left my things on the chair. I found that disrespectful, and it really disappointed me.”

“To be honest, I expected a different approach from you, especially since you are a teacher. A teacher, of all people, should set a good example when it comes to respect and communication. I wish you a nice day.”

Now, I understand that she’s upset. Like I said, I didn’t know who the items belonged to and I was in a hurry as I had to take my child to an appointment. I also never saw her come inside with that backpack.

Was I wrong for taking my backpack back without trying to find the owner of the items that were inside it?

AITA?

Honestly, it feels like everyone in this story behaved slightly wrongly, though nobody had any malicious intent.

Because the truth is, it’s kind of annoying that the teacher left their backpack in a closet for a year and was only interested in taking in back once another person started using it – and the way he dumped their stuff out wasn’t really right.

But at the same time, they should have checked before using something that wasn’t theirs.

Let’s see how folks on Reddit felt about this.

This person agreed that neither person really did the right thing.

While others understood how she might’ve mistaken it for a backpack with no owner.

Meanwhile, this Redditor suggested how the teacher could word their response.

The fact that the teacher only wanted their backpack back once it was gone does feel a little petty. You can’t really just leave your personal belongings lying around your workplace for a full year without expecting them to eventually go missing. It suggests that the teacher didn’t really need the backpack at all – much less need it right away once it had been moved.

Of course, the fact that the teacher didn’t need the backpack doesn’t mean to say that the cleaner should have taken it without knowing who it belonged to. They could have asked around to check first, but instead made the assumption that it would be okay to use it for their own belongings. When they found their belongings lying on the chair, they will have definitely got the message.

Between the teacher taking the backpack back with no warning and the cleaner taking it without even knowing who it belonged to, this backpack has been the source of a whole lot of drama – when really, all of this could have been avoided with just an ounce of communication.