"Work wife" vs Real life

An essay on that key person you have at work:

"The people we make fun of are the people we don't want to become. By telling a work spouse who we aren't, we're telling her who we are. For many men, this qualifies as intimacy. Admittedly, the intimacy of a work marriage is often based on stuff that no one else would get. With your work spouse, it's all inside jokes and finely honed impersonations that can never be fully appreciated by an outsider. It is the very essence of You Had to Be There. Although a lot of work-spousal activity happens in public places - at a conference table, in a meeting - the mental place you go to in those moments is a zone that no one else, other than you and your work spouse, will ever enter. When someone you both hate does something profoundly annoying or stupid, you look at each other instinctively, move an eyelash or swallow a certain way, and everything is thoroughly grokked and agreed. "