Battle Lines

It would seem that the Nameless Roommate and I have re-entered the battlefield. That’s just great. I just love walking on eggshells in my own home.

The difference between this fight and the last fight is that I’m deciding not to deal with it. The last time we went through this I was apologetic and open for communication. I wanted to face it head on, fix it, and move on. This time, however, I frankly don’t give a shit. If she wants it resolved (I don’t think she does), then she’ll have to put forth the effort. Until then I’ll continue to be the roommate who pretends to live alone.

Let me lay out what this means, exactly. This means when I come home from work early in the morning, I’ll clean up any messes that are the direct result of me. While doing any dishes that are mine in the sink, I’ll make sure to bang the pots together loudly. When I’m digging cleaning products out from under the sink, I’ll slam the cabinet doors shut. When scooping the litter box, I’ll dig and dig and dig loudly around the bottom of it until I have every last clump out of there. I’ll clean my room and vacuum thoroughly (especially by the door that connects the two bedrooms. I won't worry about waking her up, as I'm sure vampires sleep soundly.

When I’m in the common living space, and she walks into the room I pretend I don’t see her, hear her or feel her presence. She does the same. I let her mess accumulate until I can’t stand it, then I pick it up and pile it outside her bedroom door in hopes that she’ll step on it and pick it up. This includes any empty cups or soda cans, empty cigarette boxes, wrappers left strewn by the computer, old fast food bags and cups, and the dog crap her dog left on the floor that she neglected to remove.

Oh, and if her boyfriend doesn’t quit leaving the toilet seat up, I will speak up about it. But it will be an announcement (if we had an intercom that would be great) along the lines of, "I don’t live with a man. I live with a woman. If men visitors cannot put the toilet seat down, then the female occupants of the apartment need to check behind them to make sure it is done." By the way, Dave has spent the night several times and he’s never left the toilet seat up. It’s nice to know I can pick a guy I don’t have to clean up after.

What the fight started over, to me, is stupid. I spilled a soda in her car when I swerved to miss a jackass on the railroad tracks. I told her about it. I apologized. I even offered to pay for carpet cleaning materials and to clean up the mess. She took her keys back.

I don’t have a car. I moved in with her because she had nowhere to go when her ex kicked her out on her ass. The agreement was that I got to use her car for work and errands. It would seem that she’s gone back on that word.

So I am living with somebody who doesn’t keep promises. Essentially I’m living with somebody I can’t trust. I can’t believe anything she says.

The family downstairs is getting fed up with her, too. Her dogs shit in the backyard, and she doesn’t pick it up. In the lease it says they are responsible for maintaining the yard, and I don’t blame them for not wanting to mow over piles of dog shit. But, hey, if she can’t even clean it up off the carpet inside the house, what makes you think she’ll clean it up out of the yard?

The piles of shit in the back yard aren’t the only complaints they have. Her new boyfriend and her have a lot of sex. Good for them. At least one of us is having a lot of sex. But she does it loudly with lots of banging. The little kids downstairs can hear this, as can the pregnant woman who’s been ordered to bed rest. She’s politely told her that she can hear everything they’re doing, and perhaps they’d like to keep it down when it’s late at night. The nameless roommate usually responds sympathetically and promises she'll keep it down only to return in full force even louder the next night. The result of this has knocked pictures off the walls downstairs and has caused the pregnant woman to become enraged with anger. The last time she confronter her, the nameless roommate claimed she wasn't even home that night. So she likes to lie, evidently.

Nobody’s telling her to stop having sex, just stop doing it so loudly so late at night. You know... it’s a respect issue (and she seems to know a lot about respect because she won’t shut up about how I've disrespected her car).

The solution, to me, is simple. Grow up. Take responsibility for your actions and your pets. And quit blaming everybody around you just because you can’t control everything around you. Oh, and maybe get your head examined... I'm starting to think you're crazy. And honestly, I don't know how long I can live with crazy before I kick crazy out.

The Roommate... Nameless.

I'm a 25 year old woman living with another 25 year old woman. We live on the top floor of a big house in the middle of a small town. Downstairs from us lives a family in which the mom stays at home with the young kiddies and prepares to pop out another baby come November. If you made the setting more urban and had the eligible handsome brother of the stay at home mom move in down stairs... you'd have the makings of a sitcom.

But life isn't a sitcom.

I love my apartment. It's cute, eclectic, roomie and it's a great place to pass my time. It really feels like home to me.

I love my roommate, too. She's a friend of mine from Junior High. She moved away in high school, but came back to the area after graduation. We crossed paths about two years ago after not seeing her since she moved away at age 15. We hit it off and picked up where we left off in high school.. and then some.

She was engaged. And, I had a hard time deciding if I liked him or not. When I'd come over to hang out, he was always polite and seemed hospitable. The three of us would engage in long conversations, and he seemed witty and funny while entertaining his fiance's friends. He seemed alright.

It was when she called me after they'd been fighting that I started to have feelings of dislike for him. About a year ago he told her she was too fat (the girl's average sized). Instead of telling to shove it where the sun don't shine (my opinion), she went on a diet and started exercising.

When she lost her job last November he hounded her to get a new job, telling her she was worthless unless she was bringing in some cash. I agree that women should have their own money, but he made enough for the two of them... and if you love somebody they're never worthless, right? He even went so far as to tell her that until she got a job she wasn't allowed to tell him she loved him. She wasn't allowed to kiss him. She wasn't allowed to hug him. And she wasn't allowed to sleep in the same bed with him. This is when I would have left (scratch that... I would have left when he called me fat).

She stuck it out.

Fast forward to April. She calls me one night, frantic and crying. He'd given her two options. One... he pays to fix her car and gives her 500 dollars in start up money and she moves out by the end of the month. Or two... He'll have her forcibly removed. Great.. get out, or get out.

She took the former deal... regretting not having put her name on the deed to her great grandmother's house the two of them shared. She took the money he offered and moved in with me... and here we are.

To say the least, this girl is insecure. She hasn't been on the dating scene since high school, she's used to having her identity spelled out for her, and she's in a really, really, really fragile state right now.

It's been less than three months and we've had a few issues, and they all boil down to the fact that she doesn't love or respect herself.

I fear that she'll continue to let men walk all over her, because she's not giving herself any time to heal after this horrific break up. In fact, for the first month after she moved in with me, her "fiance" was coming over every weekend and fucking her brains out. He finally broke it off when he met a chubby, unemployed girl at a bar. She now lives with him... she's bigger than my roommie and she doesn't work... that's enough to make a girl go insane with questions, too.

I hope she grows up, soon. Because sometimes I feel like I'm living with a teenager. She has mood spells where she doesn't speak to me. During these spells she insists on communicating through notes. It seems she has a new crush every week, and she's constantly on the phone. Doesn't that spell out teenager to you?

I will admit, though, she is working and she does more than her fair share of work around here. Yesterday we had a good talk and I feel like she's growing everyday. In reality I'm proud of her. I hate that things had to get so bad with her ex for her to realize her own needs, but I'm glad that she's finally aware. That's what quarter life crises are for, right?

Are We Still in High School?

The Prom, Friday night football, pep rallies, after school organizations, parties, getting your driver's licence, and graduation. High school can hold some fond memories. Nothing beats that feeling when you're 16, and you have your very own car. You fill it up with friends and go cruisin down some back roads. You have the world at your feet, and you're too young and too immature to know what to do with it.

Just about everybody I know says they wouldn't go back to high school. Mostly, because they've changed since then and they don't like the person they were all those years ago. I think it'd be interesting to run into the 17 year old version of myself. First I'd give myself a hug and then I'd tell myself to buckle up because it's going to be a rough ride.

I'd also like to run into the 50 year old version of myself to see if I survive this quarter life conundrum. Much like the teenage angst years, though, I'm sure I'll survive this semi-charmed life.

It's sad to me, though, when I run into people from high school who haven't changed a bit. I see former football stars sitting at the bar swapping former stats with somebody who graduated ten years before them. They have a smile on their face as they recall the glory they felt when they went to state or won the big homecoming game, but the smile turns into a frown as they realize those days are long behind them. Those days can't be relived. But these are the few people who would like to go back. They walk a lonely path wishing they could be the person they were back then. It's sad to peak in high school.

I have a friend, Dave. He was the class clown. He was a jock. He was a hottie, and he was popular. He still lives in this small town, as do I. We weren't friends in high school. We ran with different crowds, and, as we all know, crowds don't mix well in high school. He did a lot of growing up, though, and it amazes me sometimes at how well rounded of a grown up he turned out to be.

Dave and I don't hang out too often, but when we do we manage to have fun. He gripes about the same things I gripe about and he's passionate about the same things I'm passionate about. It's easy for me to talk to him, and he makes me laugh. When we run into his old friends from high school, he's polite to them, but he never mingles with them for long. He knows they haven't changed, and as an adult he sees them as the adolescents they once were. He says he's almost ashamed to admit he was once one of them.

My friends in high school were the bunch who thought they were mature. They thought the rest of the class just needed to catch up with them. They yearned for the day when the jocks and preps would finally be mature enough to accept them. But, I hate to admit that we were guilty of the same things they did.

They looked down on us for being interested in the things we spent our time doing. But, we looked down on them just as much for being into sports. They never invited us to parties, but then again, we never extended an invitation to them either.

As I've grown into a woman I've let down that barrier and I have no qualms about hanging out with somebody I've "known" for a long time but never really got to know before now. Some of my friends aren't of this same opinion.

I've kept about half the friends I had in high school. I hate to admit that I've lost correspondence with some who were, at one point, very important people in my life. The ones I hang out with on a regular basis have grown up and adopted the same attitude I have. But, there are some who are still in my life who haven't. And, I found out recently that I live with one of them.

My roommate, who I have yet to introduce on here, has recently thrown slander towards Dave. She refuses to really get to know him. She doesn't care to try and understand how people change, even though, she, herself, has changed a lot in recent years. She won't trust herself enough to open her mind to the possibility that maybe he's not the ass he was back then. She can't see that he's grown up and turned into a rather fine man. She simply doesn't trust him with no real reason.

No, she does have a reason. The reason is this guy she's seeing (on the down low). This guy refuses to openly date her because he doesn't want anybody knowing he's back on the market after getting divorced. I, personally, think he's stringing her along and just making it as easy as possible to break it off with her in the future. She, however, sees him as a highly sensitive soul learning to trust again. He says he doesn't trust Dave, therefore she doesn't trust Dave. He, by the way, hasn't spoken to Dave in years. He's judging a man based on who he was as a kid.

This really bothers me, because my friends have, essentially, turned into the people we once despised. If I were easily influenced (like a teenager) I just might jump on the bandwagon and decide that I don't trust Dave as well. But, I can't do that. I like him too much. I like his company. I've seen nothing but proof that he's grown up, and I hate to admit that I haven't seen much in the way of proof that my roommate has grown up.

Sure she's a responsible bill payer and she holds a job. She understands the meaning of living a grown up life, but her mentality is still stuck in high school. She's easily led, and she's easily bothered. She has lower self-esteem than any 15 year old I've met, and she has the tendency to blow things way out of proportion. She, really, needs to grow the fuck up.

I'm getting tired of dealing with her constant insecurities. I'm growing weary of explaining to her that it doesn't matter what people say or think about you as long as you know what the truth is. I'm utterly exhausted with her constant state of boy crazy and her belief that every guy she goes on a date with is her future husband. And I've really, really had it with the fact that she insists on communicating through written notes as if we're in study hall.

She can't do confrontation, and I don't mind confrontation in the slightest. I like to talk out problems and find solutions, where she would rather write down what's bothering her, leave it for me in the living room, and put at the bottom of it that she doesn't want to talk about it. She doesn't want to hear my side. She's allowed to vent, but I, alas, am not.

In short... I'm not a teacher and I'm getting sick of babysitting a 16 year old.