He needs his own

The little things you have to get used to about living with someone would be the things you’d laugh at if you were an outsider watching as the scenarios play out.

I was at CVS yesterday where a couple was walking down the travel aisle where you can get anything you need, miniaturized. The girl picked up a tiny tube of toothpaste and placed it in the basket she held. Her boyfriend did the same. She told him she had already picked up toothpaste, thinking he did not see her. He said he knew, but he needed his own. She said, what he probably already knew, that they were only going away for a short time and one toothpaste would be enough for both of them. He agreed but said he needed his own. She called him crazy and he laughed. They kept discussing it. To him it was simple. He needed his own.

Why though?

To her, it was impossible to understand—why spend more when we have what we need? And why don't you want to share with me? Perhaps she, the woman, was acting as the more practical and rational one this time.

Less independence

When you're 30 and you move in with your boyfriend, after living on your own for many years, it's much different than if you acquire the boyfriend roommate when you're 22 or 23. You have to get used to letting someone know what time you'll be home and where you're going. You have to comply with their standards of cleanliness and neatness, share in the regular household chores and agree on how to decorate with your stuff and his stuff. You have to accept that my furniture is much newer and nicer than yours, so we'll keep it and get rid of yours.

The longer you've lived on your own, the more selfish you become. I don't mean to say all people who live on their own are extremely selfish or think the world revolves around them. I just believe it is more likely that they have to pay extra attention and work extra hard to realize their actions or inactions are much more important in the new “living together partnership.” My parents were 19 and 24 when they married and did most things in sync at the beginning of their marriage. I think, at 30, we'll start out less in sync and grow to be more the same in the future.

If you moved in with your boyfriend at a younger age you may not have had the chance to do only for yourself over the course of years. You and your boyfriend will learn together how to live on your own away from the parents. You will buy furniture and decorations together and not have to throw away the things you've collected on your own while living without him.

So when we're 30 and moving in together, he agrees his furniture is crap and we can keep mine, even though it's white shabby chic. He agrees that I have more clothes then him and the bigger closet is in the bedroom so I get the bedroom closet. Lying on his bed makes us sea sick, so we keep my bed and trash his. Everything in the bedroom is mine and now he doesn't feel like it's his bedroom. He has to make a major adjustment because not only is he used to having his own room, but now he will have one that looks nothing like the way he'd decorate his own room. The two smaller closets in the hallway are his. He says his bedroom is the hallway. I tell him to buy pictures or anything he can to add to make it more “our bedroom” and I really mean it.

It was so easy to enjoy his company and fall in love with him, but compromise and sacrifice are harder when you're older. You've lead more of your own life for you. I'd never regret first moving in with someone at 30 because I think the experiences I've had on my own were amazing whether good or bad...just because they were my own. Living together is so different, and even while there may always be some small bumps in our merged paths, partly because we have developed independently for many years, we will be so much happier that we are together now.

The ease of being patient with him

I moved in with G and his roommate for one month during this transition time until our apartment is ready. Their living room is a lot smaller than it was before because my boxes line the walls, decreasing the size of the room by at least three feet on each side. We moved all my stuff from Huntington Beach to Culver City using two cars in 4 trips. Now we’re going to move again, into our new apartment. G packs his stuff, making the apartment even smaller and sometimes forgetting to leave a pathway so no one trips over random trinkets from the past 10 years of his life. There is nothing like clutter and moving over a one month span to agitate a person. This may be one of those little trials to see how well two people work/live together and get along in close quarters before they get married. We haven’t fought or gotten angry at one another. In fact, I believe we will pass this test because even as I sit here typing in the midst of mountains formations created by cardboard boxes, I watch him make these mountains into the Alps and I still want to pull him over and kiss his head.

Fighting to Agree

G and I started talking about how men become possibly more attractive and distinguished as they become older, while women seem to have to work harder on their appearance as they change with age. This is an opinion both G and I share—not about everyone, but most. In our discussion, we tried to figure out why nature lets this course of action occur.

I think that men will sleep with anyone and women are much pickier. Therefore, men have to keep looking good naturally, so they will be chosen by a woman. This way, a woman will be more likely to choose an attractive man, even as he grows old. G thinks, in most species the woman are dominant, choosing their mate. Humans have just created a social dynamic where men have been dominant in the past. Therefore, it is up to the woman who she will be with, not the man.

Using different reasoning, we came to the very same conclusion. This happens a lot. We will explain something in two very different ways, but arrive at the same determination. Sometimes we think we are having a disagreement for fifteen minutes before we realize we mean the same exact thing.

Drapes

My boyfriend (let's call him G for short) saw an episode of Everybody Loves Raymond where the brother moves into a new apartment and his girlfriend wants him to get drapes. The brother doesn't understand the purpose of drapes and doesn't like them, but the girlfriend is of the opinion that drapes are very necessary. Now G referrs to the "drape" scene often whenever I talk about decorating our future apartment.

One thing we agreed we both wanted was a dark brown--espresso or chocolate-- leather sofa. We learned that so many of the sofas at furniture stores around L.A. are bicast. G defines bicast leather as bologna leather. When I looked it up I found that it's a mix of some leather with a plastic covering or no real leather is used at all. In the UK and New Zealand, they aren't allowed to call bicast leather. After researching furnture further, we learned that pieces can be up to 1/3rd of the price in Mexico, which is just a few hours drive. Showrooms in L.A. even go down to Mexico and buy there to to sell here.

On Saturday we borrowed G's parents' big car, and headed south of of the border, starting in Rosarito. (U.S. truck and trailer rental companies don't let you take their equipment to Mexico.) There was lots of wrought iron and wood and some bologna leather in the tiny huts along side the dirt road. They were beautiful creations, but not what we were looking to find. Just as we were thinking we made this trip for no reason, a cop pulled us over. I quickly pulled out a 20 and slipped it into G's hand, just in case this policia would take a bribe. The cop wore braces and sunglasses and spoke to G in Spanish. Luckily, he's fluent. He said G made an illegal uturn. Hmmm...I know we made a left turn, but not a uturn. Perhaps driving into Tijuana in a massive Ford Expedition with California plates attracted Mr. Brace Face Policia's attention and he was looking for a bribe from some rich Americans. If we didn't find furnture that day, at least we would add to the Mexican economy through bribery. The cop told G that he was going to take his license down to the "place where you pay tickets" and after G and I were done shopping, we could pay the small fine and get his license back. Since G knew that having to find a cheap motel in Tijuana for the night was not option for me, he slickly pulled out the 20 I handed him and asked the policia if he'd like to buy some beers on us instead. The cop thought that was a great idea and let us go. Then we saw a furnture store and found a modern livingroom set for $1,2000, $1,000 less than the bologna leather in California. The day only cost us $1,2020.

I think we need pillows to add color to our livingroom since the furniture is all brown. "What color do you like for pillows," I asked G. "Brown," he said, completely missing the point of using pillows to add color to the livingroom. We finally agreed that red would look nice and I set out on my mission to buy red pillows. Five stores later, I found pillows that are not floral, not too shiny, not feminine and without any girly hints of pink. Hopefully they'll serve their purpose as a decorative accent, just like drapes in Everybody Loves Raymond.

Old School

Moving in with a boyfriend was always an unspoken and known no no in my family. The strong Sicilian old school style of my father pervaded our home and my Jewish mother submitted to this ideal. I submitted to this “ideal” and my younger sister always had too. Then we got older and my view, and I learned my sister’s also view became; get engaged, then move in with him.

She got engaged and moved in with him. They weren’t 19 and 24 like my parents when they got married, but 27 and 30 instead and they were ready to start combining their stuff and buying more stuff together. Also, after having many roommate experiences (some great, some traumatic and horrible), something my parents never had, they wanted to learn how to live with each other before the ultimate commitment.

“What about religion?” my father said to my mother. “Don’t they believe in God?” he went on. This sin against God--moving in with your boyfriend--is the worst thing that someone could possible do.

He never took us to church or said a prayer with us. Not once during our entire childhood. My mother took us to the Synagogue a few times and said a Chanukah prayer with us, but religion was more about food and culture to us. I used to think and think about what I wanted to be…Catholic or Jewish. My mother’s friend told me I didn’t have to choose, but that didn’t make sense to me at the time when I was so young. I decided culture was enough for me for now. If anything my mother should be upset, but she wasn’t. She feels that as long as you trust that there is a plan to get married and have children, at this age (I’m 30 and she’s dying to have grandchildren) it’s ok but still not ideal.

So, what about religion? Don’t people who have chosen a strong faith live with their boyfriends? Yes! I know plenty of them. In fact, they have babies before their vows are taken too.

Stew of Life

I am in a stew. A stew of happiness, love, sadness, fear and hopefulness. Happiness for being so in love with someone and for feeling there is actually someone I want to spend the rest of my life with and for seeing him as someone I would be so lucky to have in my life each and every day forever. Sadness for not being near my family and for seeing them only a few times year. Fearful for not winning him over enough to want to move away to NY with me, from California—the place he loves. Still hopeful that he will come and love me in NY, and more importantly love who he is in NY.