The Livin' Ain't Easy

I hate moving. Hate it. The only things I hate more than moving are the holocaust, the Yankees, George Bush, Mitt Romney, and my motherfucking neighbors. My motherfucking neighbors are "musicians." They go to Berkeley. They have faces full of very alternative and hip piercings. They smoke in the hallways. They turn on their amps at 10:45 on weeknights and practice their chords, the dulcet tones clearly audible in my room as I am trying to sleep. They have keggers on weekends. My roommates, who have gone upstairs countless times to ask them to turn it down, report there is no furniture in their apartment, save a turntable and a beer pong setup in the kitchen.

My roommate E has been in the apartment for four years, roommate Deb and I for three, and A for two. We've been good tenants the whole time-- paid our rent on time, taken good care of the apartment, all the stuff landlords dream of. Since our motherfucking neighbors moved in, we've called the cops on them at least eight times. Eight times. I was barely living there when I dated the Whatever, and he and I called the cops on them three times. We'd go out, get drunk, come back, get chips and soda at 7-Eleven, order pizza, eat it and the party upstairs was still going. You'd think if the good tenants were complaining about noise and threatening to leave, you'd want to get rid of the new punks who pay less rent than the apartment full of quiet, respectful girls. You'd be wrong. E freaked out on my landlord last week, telling him she'd be moving out unless he did something about the noise upstairs. He told her, fine, leave, he's not doing anything.

I'd be happy to leave before September too. I don't want to live with three other people anymore. Sharing a bathroom with three people is difficult. Sharing a kitchen with three people, even if one of them doesn't cook with anything other than the George Foreman, is difficult. Not being able to have a cat because of allergies is difficult. I like the physical layout of my place, the location is amazing, and my room itself is pretty nice. But between the neighbors, the lassiez-faire landlord and the interpersonal relationships between three willful girls, it's time for me to live more civilized.

Ideally, I'd love to live alone in a quiet, professionals-only building. Alicia has a studio with an alcove big enough to make a makeshift "bedroom" out of, and it's lovely. It's quiet. She can watch whatever she wants on TV. She can leave a magazine out on the coffee table without annoying anybody but herself. Unfortunately, she makes way more money than I do, and has far fewer student loans. This is Boston, and the living's not easy. I told Deb that we could find a two bedroom place in the same area we're in now, and she seemed okay with that idea.

I've been perusing Craigslist, but there's not much to be had there. I have pretty tight search criteria ($1450 or less, heated, no basement- or first-floor apartments, in my neighborhood or thereabouts) and I keep getting places that look just as run-down and unloved as my place now is. Out of boredom and frustration with the asshole companies that say there are pictures in their post and it turns out to be a picture of their business cards, I looked at real estate for sale.

That is the promised land.

Look how beautiful this place is. Sweet Jesus. Laundry. A gorgeous kitchen. In the same neighborhood as I am now. A fireplace! In the bedroom! I'd start bringing home random men just to make out with them in front of a roaring fire. I can imagine staying in Boston forever when I see this place. Turning the second bedroom into a nursery when I can afford to adopt a baby. It's all so clear. My life would be nothing but sunshine and tasteful dinner parties in this place.

Then I did a mortgage calculation on how much it would cost. $2,334 a month. Without fees or taxes or utilities or, you know, food. Even if I rented out the second, non-fireplaced bedroom, that's way too much. Even if I freelanced like a fiend, I couldn't afford it. Even if I had a boyfriend and an entire eastern European family living there, I couldn't afford it. And my imaginary cat would probably get out in all the confusion. My dreams of tasteful dinner parties and salacious make-out sessions evaporate as pesky reality awakens me.

There's this place, which is nice, but in a more Allston-y neighborhood. I don't want noisy people carousing outside and barfing on my doorstep. This place costs only $1511 a month, which could be manageable with a roommate, but it doesn't have the sexy fireplace or orgasmically good kitchen.

I can only hope the Powerball tickets I asked my Mom to buy come through for me. I don't need half a billion dollars or whatever the jackpot is-- just $150,000 would do. Enough to pay my loans and put a nice down payment on a place.

If I didn't have student loans, it would be possible for me to save up some money and buy a place. It would take a while, but I could manage it. But spending $400 bucks a month in loan payments is keeping me from that beautiful rite of passage, of buying a condo and an assload of IKEA furniture, waiting for the day when I could begin to replace that stuff with long-lasting, beautiful pieces. Since I've worked at my company, several people have left simply because they can't afford the housing around here. After years of apartment living, of paying out bucketloads of money to lazy landlords, the desire to nest and settle in a place of one's own became too much and the cool people leave. I hope that I can somehow afford a beautiful place near Boston, because I love it here. But as I get older, I want not only a room of my own, but a bathroom I can keep my makeup in and some peace and fucking quiet.