(no subject)
Mar. 9th, 2010 09:12 am![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
stormdog(I wrote this on the way home last night, but I couldn't post it due to my router having, apparently, crapped out. I'll have to figure that out tomorrow when I'm not out until nine-thirty at night.)
----------------
![[livejournal.com profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/external/lj-userinfo.gif)
moiracoon called me at work today to tell me that our landlord wanted to know why we were moving. He'd gotten a call from the apartment we were looking at moving to, at the number we put on the rental application. He left her a message, and she left one with his secretary when she called back.
She was nervous, and I was too. I was worried that he'd be upset we didn't tell him first before applying. That he'd want to start showing our house immediately with all of our stuff in it. Still, I told her not to worry too much; that it probably wasn't any big thing. We'd just explain that, with our dog not in the picture, we didn't need the space and were looking for someplace cheaper.
As it happens, when they two of them did manage to talk, what he really wanted was to try to keep us as tenants. In fact, he offered to reduce our rent by a little over a hundred dollars a month, to match what we'd be paying for the apartment in Racine we applied for.
That's a tremendous deal. The odds of finding a decent rental house in Kenosha for that price are pretty low. And it is kind of tempting. I like Kenosha a lot, and my family is there, and a house gives us room. Room to have a dog. Room to set up the forge...that I never use. Room to set up antennas for the ham radio...that I never bought or was licensed for. Room to have parties and fires in the backyard...that I never kept up with or had people over in.
I love the idea of living in a house. Having room, space, privacy, is wonderful in theory. In practice, I just don't know how to take care of a yard. We have so much stuff that we never really had space. Admittedly, the issue with stuff could be resolved, but I'm actually looking forward to living somewhere with less room where I'll be forced to have less stuff. There's too much. And I really won't miss mowing the grass, or shoveling snow. I won't miss living with the house at sixty degrees to try to keep our energy bill under $250 in the dead of winter. (All utilities are included in the apartment rent.)
My forge is one of the things I'll miss most. I kept intending to get my life organized so that I don't have to worry about the housework and other things to do and start doing things like metalwork. Maybe I can find another place to set it up from time to time. As I told my grandpa when he asked, there's no way I'm getting rid of it! Someday I'll be able to use it again. I'll miss, too, being so very near my parents, and near Serinthia and Todd. Still, it's only half an hour away, so I expect I'll still be over to visit nearly every Tuesday and Wednesday just like now. It just means that, instead of driving over to pick up my brother and go back for games, I'll probably just stay at my parents' house to play.
But I'm digressing. What I really wanted to write about was how that request for us to stay makes me feel. I feel like I'm disappointing our landlord by saying no. I feel like I'm letting him down. As if the shared bond of rental property has somehow made us friends.
And of course, it hasn't. He could be a really fantastic guy who plays video games, reads Cat Valente, and votes green. He could be a penny-pinching suit who eats and sleeps business and is just in it for the money. I have no idea. (Though I have to say, the fact that whenever we had a an issue with the house, we had a handyman or tech over the next day to fix the problem makes me think he cares how we're doing at least a bit.)
I guess I just want to be able to call him back and tell him what a great offer he's made and that he's convinced me to stay where I am. I want there to be a good compromise and for everybody to feel good about having helped each other out. I don't want him to have to look for another tenant in this economy either. But I don't think I can do that.
I think instead I'll have to explain that, without our dog we don't need the house, and as much as we like the privacy and space of a detached house, we can still save an extra hundred to two hundred dollars a month in the apartment and live more comfortably and not have to deal with yardwork. I want him to know that he's been a fantastic landlord in every way. I want him to feel appreciated.
I think there's more to it than that. I feel sad about leaving Kenosha behind, even though I'm really not and I'll be right next door. I feel bad about leaving our house behind, even though it's not really our house. I get so attached to things sometimes. And just as there are subtleties underlying the meanings of similar words, there are subtleties inherent in living in a house versus an apartment.
A house is for gatherings and big parties. A house is for barbecues and firepits and inflatable pools. A house is for decorating spaces and hanging art and painting walls. An apartment isn't quite the same thing, in my mind. Somehow, a house is a place for family to me, even if that family is chosen family rather than blood family. I guess, on top of giving up a dog, and a forge and other physical things, I feel like I'm giving up a sort of concept of family.
And that's silly, because I'm not. We know friends with apartments who have people over all the the time and their spaces feel like the happy, sociable homes I know. But a house is what I grew up in, and on a deep level, a house will always mean my family to me, and will mean a concept of a family that I want to have. And I think that contributes to my reaction to our landlord asking us to stay. It significantly depressed my mood for a while, and I had to think about why as I shut my computer down, walked to my train, and got on board. And what you just read is what I came up with.
-------------
Now, all that aside, I am really excited about moving into this apartment! It sounds awesome, and I can't wait to have some extra money to make the place look nice, some room of my own to make just so, and a clean space to have many, many friends come to visit. I'm ready for a change!
----------------
moiracoon called me at work today to tell me that our landlord wanted to know why we were moving. He'd gotten a call from the apartment we were looking at moving to, at the number we put on the rental application. He left her a message, and she left one with his secretary when she called back.She was nervous, and I was too. I was worried that he'd be upset we didn't tell him first before applying. That he'd want to start showing our house immediately with all of our stuff in it. Still, I told her not to worry too much; that it probably wasn't any big thing. We'd just explain that, with our dog not in the picture, we didn't need the space and were looking for someplace cheaper.
As it happens, when they two of them did manage to talk, what he really wanted was to try to keep us as tenants. In fact, he offered to reduce our rent by a little over a hundred dollars a month, to match what we'd be paying for the apartment in Racine we applied for.
That's a tremendous deal. The odds of finding a decent rental house in Kenosha for that price are pretty low. And it is kind of tempting. I like Kenosha a lot, and my family is there, and a house gives us room. Room to have a dog. Room to set up the forge...that I never use. Room to set up antennas for the ham radio...that I never bought or was licensed for. Room to have parties and fires in the backyard...that I never kept up with or had people over in.
I love the idea of living in a house. Having room, space, privacy, is wonderful in theory. In practice, I just don't know how to take care of a yard. We have so much stuff that we never really had space. Admittedly, the issue with stuff could be resolved, but I'm actually looking forward to living somewhere with less room where I'll be forced to have less stuff. There's too much. And I really won't miss mowing the grass, or shoveling snow. I won't miss living with the house at sixty degrees to try to keep our energy bill under $250 in the dead of winter. (All utilities are included in the apartment rent.)
My forge is one of the things I'll miss most. I kept intending to get my life organized so that I don't have to worry about the housework and other things to do and start doing things like metalwork. Maybe I can find another place to set it up from time to time. As I told my grandpa when he asked, there's no way I'm getting rid of it! Someday I'll be able to use it again. I'll miss, too, being so very near my parents, and near Serinthia and Todd. Still, it's only half an hour away, so I expect I'll still be over to visit nearly every Tuesday and Wednesday just like now. It just means that, instead of driving over to pick up my brother and go back for games, I'll probably just stay at my parents' house to play.
But I'm digressing. What I really wanted to write about was how that request for us to stay makes me feel. I feel like I'm disappointing our landlord by saying no. I feel like I'm letting him down. As if the shared bond of rental property has somehow made us friends.
And of course, it hasn't. He could be a really fantastic guy who plays video games, reads Cat Valente, and votes green. He could be a penny-pinching suit who eats and sleeps business and is just in it for the money. I have no idea. (Though I have to say, the fact that whenever we had a an issue with the house, we had a handyman or tech over the next day to fix the problem makes me think he cares how we're doing at least a bit.)
I guess I just want to be able to call him back and tell him what a great offer he's made and that he's convinced me to stay where I am. I want there to be a good compromise and for everybody to feel good about having helped each other out. I don't want him to have to look for another tenant in this economy either. But I don't think I can do that.
I think instead I'll have to explain that, without our dog we don't need the house, and as much as we like the privacy and space of a detached house, we can still save an extra hundred to two hundred dollars a month in the apartment and live more comfortably and not have to deal with yardwork. I want him to know that he's been a fantastic landlord in every way. I want him to feel appreciated.
I think there's more to it than that. I feel sad about leaving Kenosha behind, even though I'm really not and I'll be right next door. I feel bad about leaving our house behind, even though it's not really our house. I get so attached to things sometimes. And just as there are subtleties underlying the meanings of similar words, there are subtleties inherent in living in a house versus an apartment.
A house is for gatherings and big parties. A house is for barbecues and firepits and inflatable pools. A house is for decorating spaces and hanging art and painting walls. An apartment isn't quite the same thing, in my mind. Somehow, a house is a place for family to me, even if that family is chosen family rather than blood family. I guess, on top of giving up a dog, and a forge and other physical things, I feel like I'm giving up a sort of concept of family.
And that's silly, because I'm not. We know friends with apartments who have people over all the the time and their spaces feel like the happy, sociable homes I know. But a house is what I grew up in, and on a deep level, a house will always mean my family to me, and will mean a concept of a family that I want to have. And I think that contributes to my reaction to our landlord asking us to stay. It significantly depressed my mood for a while, and I had to think about why as I shut my computer down, walked to my train, and got on board. And what you just read is what I came up with.
-------------
Now, all that aside, I am really excited about moving into this apartment! It sounds awesome, and I can't wait to have some extra money to make the place look nice, some room of my own to make just so, and a clean space to have many, many friends come to visit. I'm ready for a change!
