Office mates

As we are near the end of the semester I have time to add things here. Two comments today, this one about working with others and another about cheating.
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I had to move to a new office over the summer - a management decision. For the first time in perhaps six years I am in an open office. We can all see each other all the time. When students come in, every word is available to everyone without the pretense of cubicle dividers. It is more difficult to concentrate on my own work when I can just turn my chair half way round and participate in other people's conversations. Sometimes I feel uncomfortable sitting with my back to the "action", something that rarely happened to me when my office mates sat in different cubicles.
This time I have one office mate who regularly expresses their opinion that the students this semester are the worst ever. They talk about the usual: courtesy to each other and to faculty, lack of responsibility, poor work ethic, bad time management, low levels of academic skills, chronic complaints, etc. While I have a few students who fit into these categories (see today's other comments about cheating) most are reasonable people most of the time. This time of year the pursuit of marks generates many more screams and yells and angry messages, but that is expected. I have begun asking myself how I should react to these discourses. And I have begun asking myself if these discourses affect what I do in the classroom. I hope not.
I also wonder how I come across to my office mates. I am generally a quiet, introspective person, able to get along with most people and quite happy with my own company. I have been seen as aloof and arrogant by some people and distant by many others. I wonder about how to work in this particular room for the next five years? Life never stays still for more than a few moments. There is always a new challenge, change is never-ending. That keeps things interesting.