I’ve never lived with complete strangers. I lived in student halls at Warwick Uni when I was 22 but that doesn’t really count. It was more of a communal, safe environment and I was not an ‘adult’ back then. I was still fearless and naive with ambitions and unrealistic dreams, like most youngsters fresh out of university.
I moved from living with my family, to student halls, to living with my ex-partner of seven years to living on my own for the last two years.
I may be biased because that’s my most recent experience, but I loved living on my own. Not from day one, but definitely over the last year. So moving in a shared flat was not because I wanted to, but purely for financial reasons.
I spent last week packing, a little bit every day and last Friday I moved out from my cute, cosy studio flat to a year old, bright, modern 2-bed flat, which came with a 32 year old guy.
This year the move was smooth and uneventful (last year was a nightmare, alarms going off, lost my car keys, bruised knees for months, it was a disaster!) since I learned from my mistakes and saved money for a removal company. I’ll post more on that and what else I discovered over the last 10 days later this week.
It’s only been a couple of days and there is a lot to get used to. I don’t live on my own anymore so I can’t play the guitar at silly o’clock or put music really loud and I don’t know what the ‘social rules’ are when sharing a flat. Should I offer my ever so polite flatmate a cup of tea every time I make tea and he is around? Are we to cook on different times? Are we to become friends or keep stricter boundaries? I don’t really know the answer to these questions and I’m not sure he does either but I guess it will all fall into place. I’ve been talking to my brother in London and he is going through a similar situation right now. I’m glad it’s not just me trying to figure this out.
I still wonder whether I made the right decision, should I waited until a gal was looking for a flatmate instead of living with a guy? Should I went for more viewings, should picked a different area? At the end of the day, I made a decision and I won’t know if it was the right one until later, so I’m trying not to torture my mind.
It will take a while to have a good night’s sleep and feel like home, I still feel I’m a guest here and I will soon go back to my old home but we humans are incredible when it comes to adjusting to change. I’m sure it will soon feel as I’ve been here for years.
I love what I’ve done with my new room in just three days and with minimum spending. It makes a difference when I walk into my room every day and admire how beautiful it looks. I could have spent more money on getting a new bed and furniture and so on but it will all worth it in six months time when I finally repay my loan.
Although today is apparently Blue Monday, the most depressing day of the year (which is a marketing campaign by Sky Holidays based on a nonsensical, pseudo-scientific equation they made up), I don’t feel sad or depressed. I did briefly on Saturday, my first day at the new place where I felt lost and overwhelmed with all the changes but today I’m excited and terrified in equal measure of all the things yet to come.
Great things coming up I can’t wait to share them with you.
So here’s to new beginnings!
Eleni
Lessons I learned after I turned 30 
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