I live in a 1,200 square foot apartment with three other adults. I share a room with my boyfriend, Eli, and we live with his sister, Tara, and her boyfriend, Andrew. This familial setup can be difficult to describe in casual conversation, “My boyfriend’s sister’s boyfriend is also my roommate…” I enjoy our family arrangement and I like to imagine we’re living authentically in the style of “old New York” with tenement buildings occupied by floors of families. I joke about our parents someday moving in to the other two units in the building.
All domestic bliss aside, our second floor walkup, 2 bedroom, 1 bathroom space on Van Brunt is absurdly cheap split four ways. It’s what most would declare “a steal” in New York. My boyfriend, on the other hand, who most recently lived in a 1,600 square foot house with a back deck and long driveway in Tahoe, California is often overhead referring to our apartment as a “shithole.” I politely disagree, finding the front facing windows and hardwood floors satisfactory, and I appreciate our two (two!) bedroom windows and the quietness of a back bedroom in Red Hook.
What I’ve learned: space is an ideological quandary. How much space does one person need? Deserve? What’s excessive? What’s just impractical? When we have friends over they remark on what I consider the practically palatial size of our apartment, but Eli remains stubbornly unimpressed, floored by the permanent and questionable layer of grime in the bathroom or the drawer in the kitchen that has never been properly fixed or the unwelcome sight of roughly 25 pairs of shoes upon entering the apartment. “You know, there’s only 1 of 3 places I could possibly be in this apartment,” he muses. “Our room, the living room, or the bathroom.” We store the cutting boards in the oven. Our bikes stay on the street. Tara and Andrew often cook dinner around 11pm which, as a teacher, is past my bedtime. We run a fan to soften the clanging of pots and pans.
Growing up in rural New England, one can easily, perhaps even inevitably, take space for granted. If not your own home, it’s the openness of land, of trees and fields unmarked by human life. When I was ten I moved into my own bedroom and never shared a room again until moving in with Eli this past October.
Space, most especially felt in New York and other overpopulated urban spaces becomes a commodity achieved by the elite. The richer or more fortunate you are, the more personal space you can carve out. I’ve found living in such close quarters encourages the erasure of personal property and induces a community environment many find inhospitable, but I generally find cozy. Living in New York requires a certain departure from what we Americans refer to as “personal space.”
On a memorable night Tara and I tried to make two different soups at the same time. Eli has dubbed the kitchen as a “one tush kitchen” and watched warily from the other side of the counter as Tara and I performed an elaborate dance to complete our dueling soups. Since we only had one soup pot at the time. I ended up cooking my soup in an old set prop roughly the size of a lobster pot that had been recovered from the top of the fridge.
Eli and I both surreptitiously avoid entering the storage space above our closet; democratically split directly down the middle (admittedly my side is messier, and I have about 100% more clothing) because when you open the hidey-hole, it’s likely you’ll be bludgeoned to death by my backpacking pack. Other items to fall out might be my (entire) summer wardrobe or a sleeping bag. To add to the danger and inconvenience of removing an item from above the closet, one is required to balance precariously on a step ladder while blindly reaching into the dark recesses.
Under our bed: the closet doors we removed for aesthetic reasons, medical supplies, and very likely, a few of my stray books. Eli has commented nervously, “It’s like the books are taking over,” as he eyes the growing stack on his side growing higher and higher. Recently, open entering our room Eli remarked absently, “It’s so interesting to have nothing that’s my own.” This comment was partially provoked by the fact that I’ve taken to placing a few seemingly innocuous items of atop the dresser which is ostensibly Eli’s. I understood why draping my bra on his dresser is poor form, but I’ve done little to remedy the error as my “socks and underwear” drawer is overstuffed and requires a hearty maneuvering in and out, each time.
When my sister came to visit, I installed in her in the front room, which doubles as Andrew’s office. Since we don’t have room for extra bedding, I decided making her a pillow bed was the best route. Removing all the cushions from the couch meant there was no longer anywhere to sit in the living room. I attempted, fruitlessly, to lash together the pillows. My sister bravely lay down on the couch bed remarking without irony, “I haven’t been this uncomfortable since college.” In the morning she reported that the couch cushions had spread apart and she’d spent most of the night in a crack.
So, what’s the solution to these woes, one might ask?
Number 1. Have less shit.
Number 2. Move out of Brooklyn.
Number 3. Lean in.
Eli and I might not see eye to eye on the issue of space, (he’ll go onto the roof in any weather just to take in some fresh air) but I like to remind him as we squeeze companionably into the bathroom together to brush our teeth: If we can make it here, we can make it anywhere.
