Better(ish) Living With Roommates

by Megan Reynolds

I have only lived alone once, and it was not by choice. When I was a senior in college, my boyfriend broke up with me over the phone from San Diego, saddling me with a lovely studio apartment with an eat-in kitchen, lots of sun, and a rent payment that I couldn’t really afford. I paid my rent using a loan that I am still most likely paying off, and spent a lot of that long winter marooned on my bed eating frozen grapes and watching the Food Network, since I refused to cancel the expensive cable. I lived there for the whole year, alone, but was too sulky to appreciate what I had.

Like most people in their twenties, I’ve lived with lots of strangers. I lived with two sisters and a co-worker in a weird, tiny house in the Mission District in San Francisco before it was unaffordable. I lived in a sun-drenched one-bedroom with panoramic views of Sutro Tower with a girl I knew from college who did not like me very much, and then a boy I met on Craigslist whom, despite his charm, was often very late with rent and never remembered to bring his keys when he left the house.

When I moved to New York, I lived with a hairdresser who had a cat that threw up whenever houseguests came over and was, I quickly realized, not a good fit. Now, a couple years out of my twenties, I live in a nice-enough, rent-stabilized apartment in a very desirable neighborhood, with three roommates, one bathroom and two cats. It is a situation that has been working for the most part.

When you live with other people, resentment builds quickly, like a sink full of dirty dishes that you are certain are not yours, or a garbage can full of half-eaten bags of rotting kale and banana peels. Right now, one of my roommates is my sister, and we fight with unashamed passion over whose turn it is to buy cat litter, or how long is the appropriate amount of time to spend in the bathroom. There are mornings when I wake up and really, really have to pee. If one of my roommates is in the shower, I can expect to be waiting for a half hour, sitting on the couch and thinking to myself, “I would definitely pay $300 extra to use the bathroom at my leisure.” Sometimes, when I’m sitting on the couch, watching TV, blissfully alone, my heart drops at the sound of keys jingling in the hallway and footsteps falling on the stairs, because that means that someone is coming home, and I wish I was home alone — like, really, truly alone.

For the most part, the rest of my friends have shuffled off the mantle of shared living and live alone or with their partners. I have vague memories of what living alone was like, and I do get tastes of it here and there. The weekends when everyone else is gone, and I am home, free to sit in the living room and fall asleep on the couch are precious. It’s like a mini-vacation for me. I can do what I want, when I want to do it. No one will seethe if I take a shower for 45 minutes, and I don’t have to scramble to find a towel if I realize I need to get contact lens solution from my bedroom while I’m naked in the bathroom. These moments, as few as they are, are freeing.

But, I have come to learn that when I am by myself — truly and completely by myself, with no chance of anyone coming home to interrupt, I become antsy quickly. Having other people around makes the inevitable Sunday sads a little less intense, even if those other people are just sitting in their room with the door closed, watching “Marco Polo” on their iPad. Their presence is comforting. What if that mouse that lives under the stove comes back, stands on its hind legs, and starts asking me questions? What if I hear something weird outside, on the roof, and don’t want to face it alone? My roommates provide comic relief and the quiet reassurance that if something horrible happens to me in the night, my body won’t moulder in my apartment, unattended and alone, for weeks, as I am slowly eaten by my cat.

I know that no one is judging me. I am the only person concerned by this, but there’s something about living with roommates after a certain age that feels wrong. The occasional Friday night that I intended on spending in silence will be interrupted by a mini-house party in the living room, all beer cans and empty wine bottles and strangers I have to say hello to, lest I be branded the house troll. Sometimes, I just want to have my own space, that’s bigger than my bedroom and its closed door. My stories about roommate troubles and things that happen at home, when relayed to friends, sound juvenile as they come out of my mouth. I know that I am grown up enough to do things like pay my bills on time, feed myself a healthy meal and succeed at a job, but I can’t shake this tiny thing.

Every couple of months or so, when I’ve been good with my savings and have a healthy amount in the bank, I take to Streeteasy and open a zillion tabs. I think of the kind of place I could live in: something with textiles that are soft, a good couch. I’d have nice kitchen things, because I wouldn’t have to worry about someone making a frittata in the dutch oven and leaving it in the sink for three days. There would be bookshelves and the freedom to eat almond butter out of the jar while sitting on the couch. I could cry openly when if I felt like it, or pee with the door open. I would be truly, truly free.

This story is part of our Real Estate Month series.

Megan Reynolds lives in New York.

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