If you are
filthy rich, or in possession of one of those rare kinds of lives whereby your
shit is bound tightly together, you may have escaped the Era of the Share
House. If you, like me, have spent the
entirety of your twenties poor-as-fuck and often floundering, you will be
familiar with the tedium of this special time.
No matter how thoroughly you interrogate your would be house-mate during
the ubiquitously awkward interview, somehow you always wind up locked in a
battle of wills with said person over the cleaning/ persistent goon theft/
intensifying suspicion from both parties that the other is deeply insane. For Tom and me, this time has been
particularly fraught. We have come to
accept that we are either A) really bloody crap at choosing housemates, or B)
intensely delusional about our perceived status as generally OK people. The latter is entirely possible. But, no matter, because this week marks a
special time in the chronicles of our shared lives. This week we left the Era of the Share House
in our dust.
Which is why
I feel it’s appropriate to submit you to an Internet List. Come, sit by me as we bask in the musky aroma
of share-houses gone by.
Kipling Street, Moonee Ponds (18 and
Knew Literally Everything)
In the
cradle of Dame Edna and shithouse coffee, I escaped the straggling grip of my
parents and entered the equally strangling grip of an ageing couple approaching
their 21st year. How
unreasonable they were to expect me to clean the bathtub and not stay up till 4
in the room adjacent to theirs stoned and babbling to my pale and porn-obsessed
English housemate.
Stafford Street, Abbotsford (21 with
a Reluctant Boyfriend in Tow)
The first
attempt at grownup-hood having scared me back to mother’s teat, I ventured out
afresh to the most hipster-ish locale I could afford. The boyfriend I brought with me from the
suburbs hated it, and so did I until I married a job where my primary
responsibilities were boasting about being a manager and flirting with the
Italian Sommelier.
Epsom Road, Ascot Vale (22 and
Suffocated by Anxiety)
Here, sandwiched
in compromise between our parents’ place and Where I’d Rather Be, my boyfriend
and I earned true de-facto status as we hurtled at great pace toward Boring. I was no help, my once nibbling anxiety having
built to a deafening roar. Too
frightened to tell, I descended unceremoniously into a prison of my own
obsessions. Who knows if it was this or
my admission that I’d like a child sometime between now and 2050 that saw my bf
talk the walk, but suddenly the minutiae of my painstakingly structured life
was shattered. I found my self bawling
and afraid in the tiny bedroom I had spent my girlhood years.
High Street, Armadale (24 and Blinded
by Romance)
We should
have known we could never make it on THAT side of the Yarra. We should have considered the stupidity of
moving into an expensive room without so much as an inspection. But Tom and I were in the throes of new love,
and when you’re distracted by butterflies and vodka and acid (we were doing a
lot of acid), taking the first place you’re offered as A Couple seems like a
great idea. It smelt like meat. Our room had an indiscriminate wet
patch. Our housemate subsisted purely on
white-bread-tomato-sauce sandwiches. We
left after 10 days, donating the month’s rent to a dubious sandwich habit.
Eveline Street, Brunswick (24 and
After Actual Consideration)
Nicknamed
‘The Taj’ by our friends at the aptly dubbed ‘Crumble’ over the road, this
place was not so much a living space as a social convention centre. In the sort of twenty-something lifestyle
reminiscent of Monkey Grip, we
socialised, we partied, and indeed we puked.
Having ironed the rough edges from my anxiety through therapy and
hard-work, I embraced the Hipster Life with gusto, discussing over endless
drinking and drugging sessions the pointlessness of work, the problems with
society, and the idiocy of the ‘pawns’ who had been sucked into the
machine. There were arguments, yes, but
nothing that couldn’t be drowned in beer.
Thank you, government, for funding my ludicrous lifestyle. It was super fun.
Hosier Street, Eden (27 and Ready to
‘Clean up and Embrace Adulthood’)
Aware that
we had pushed partying exactly to the point where further indulgence could have
prompted an intervention, Tom and I packed up for the coast, landing in the
generously provided beach home of a close friend of Val. The waves lapped, the beach beckoned, and all
there was to do was relax. I hate
relaxing. It gives me the sweats. And so, for the first time in years, I
wrote. I couldn’t stop. Offered a Travel Writer gig by a friend with
a budding online mag, I corrupted the content with musings about my sometimes
shit life. The column, that became a
blog, that became a career, started here in the lap of boredom and suddenly,
acutely, I knew what I had to do. I had
fought, and failed, to carve a different path from that of my mother. To allow an ironic cliché, it must be in the
genes.
Geelong Road, Footscray (28 and
Brimming with Naïve Ambition)
Amongst the
throng of bogans, immigrants, drug addicts and oh-so-intrepid hipsters, Tom and
I felt strangely at home. Distracted by
our bubbling joie de vivre, we somehow managed to assemble a share house
comprising a raging alcoholic, a pathological liar, and a tragically OCD hermit.
Our grog was stolen, our disbelief forced
into perpetual suspension, our tether run dangerously short by paranoid accusations
of Pyrex jug theft, but care, we did not.
Finally Going Somewhere, my writing was garnering a tentative reception,
Tom’s dreams being realised in the cultivation of his hobby farm at Wang. Here, as I people-watched and scribbled endless
notes, we battled encroaching poverty and worked our (disappointingly
lacklustre) bums off. On the verge of
frustration as I rounded the 2 year mark of striving for creative legitimacy, I
was finally approached by a magazine, and then another, and another. One night, as the alcoholic vomited violently
in the room adjacent, I told Tom I was sick of the share house life. He couldn’t have looked happier.
Stamps Lane, Wangaratta (29 and
Embracing Domesticity)
Here we are, and I was wrong. We will never escape the share house life. But for all the fun we’ve had, I’ll take a
dog, a kitten, and a harem of jubilant farm animals for housemates any day.
