Living Alone

Mike: Nicole, earlier this week, Ester wrote about what’s it worth for us to live alone. You and I live alone in our respective cities. Want to talk about how that happened?

Nicole: Absolutely! Although I think it was more of a choice than a “happened.” It’s not like I had living alone thrust upon me.

Mike: Hah, yes. It was my decision as well.

Nicole: In my case, I’ve alternated between living alone and living with roommates at various points in my adult life. I had one really good set of roommates, but I’ve also had awkward or not-fun roommate situations. So when I moved to Seattle, I picked living alone. What about you?

Mike: Well, in New York you kind of have to have roommates to make your rent payments affordable. But I think I just got near the end of my twenties and felt like I needed my own space and was willing to make the sacrifices to make it work. I’m a very anti-drama kind of roommate, which means that I never left any passive aggressive notes about washing dishes or buying paper towels or anything of that nature — I would just wash the dishes or buy the paper towels. There was no, “It’s your turn to clean the bathroom!” I just cleaned the bathroom when it needed to be cleaned. So part of moving into my own space was just being able to do what I wanted for my own sake. When I got a big raise at work, that was it, I was ready.

Nicole: I think it’s interesting that we attach the word “sacrifices” to living alone, because I feel like I’ve made many more sacrifices to live with other people. Like, yes, you get a little bit more space to share among yourselves, but like you said, there’s always that one person who’s doing all of the dishes or is accommodating himself/herself to the other roommates. I wrote about it on one of my Billfold posts: at one point I was paying my roommates’ rent.

Mike: Hah, wow, well at the point, yes, it’s time to move. I guess the sacrifices I made to live with other people were ones that really didn’t have to do with money, and the sacrifice I’ve made to live alone has everything to do with money. When I got my own place, I essentially doubled the amount of rent I was paying before, plus I was going to start to pay for all of the utilities by myself. So: Goodbye cable. Goodbye to shopping for things I wouldn’t have thought twice about buying before. Goodbye to the dinners and drinks out that I wouldn’t have thought twice about going to before. So there are those trade-offs. But hmm, it’s been three or four years now, and it’s been really good? I’ve increased my income every year by working my butt off — I guess that’s another trade-off. I work a lot. But it’s because I have so many financial obligations.

Nicole: I also work a lot and that’s one of the things I wanted to make sure was part of this conversation: when you freelance, or work from home, it’s kind of essential to have your own space. (It would probably be a better world if all working adults got a bit of their own space, but…)

So I’ve seen Craigslist ads that specify: NO FREELANCERS, NO WORK FROM HOME. Other people don’t want the roommate who is in the house all day long because that’s where her job is. Not that I couldn’t go to a coffee shop, but it’s so much easier to have a workspace in your home.

Mike: Yeah, totally. Although I also have a full-time job outside of this site that makes me travel a lot, so I suppose if I did have roommates, they would really enjoy having the place to themselves whenever I was gone. But that’s the great thing about living alone: You don’t have to care about that. You do whatever you want at your own speed. I’m wondering now if I’d be willing to go back to a situation with roommates, and I think it would only be due to financial concerns. Would you?

Nicole: I would be really hesitant to live with strangers. I would move in with a significant other, and I have a shortlist of four or five friends who I think would make excellent roommates and we’d get along great. But I don’t want to do the roommate roulette thing again. If you spin wrong, it puts so much stress on the rest of your life.

Mike: You know, I’ve actually never lived with strangers? I’ve only lived with friends, or with people that, say, my college placed me with (does that count?). I don’t think I could live with a stranger at this point either. Though if the choice were to move in with a stranger or move back in with my parents, I would definitely choose the stranger (sorry, Mom!).

Nicole: I’m actually spending much less now to live by myself in Seattle than I spent to live with strangers in Los Angeles. So location is everything, I guess. Even if I were to move in with somebody, it would probably be equivalent to what I’m paying now.

Mike: Totally true about location. Okay, so the paper towels thing. I spend so much less on paper towels! It’s crazy how many paper towels people use. I can make one roll last for like, two months. Also toilet paper. Not the two months thing, but I don’t have to buy it as often, lol.

Nicole: I use cloth. No paper towels, no paper napkins. (Yes, I do use toilet paper.) It is so liberating.

Mike: I wouldn’t not judge you for using cloth toilet paper. Or no toilet paper? A bidet basically. Or one of those Japanese toilets that clean you.

Nicole: When I taught Shakespeare in Hyderabad, I used a lota. So technically I know how to not use toilet paper. Is that TMI?

Mike: Lol, maybe you and Ester can talk about that next week!

Photo: Jenny Downing

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