-{ redgeek.net }-

Shit went down in the household tonight. I approached both Roommate and his Fiance about the whole situation when she got home. Now, I wanted to just approach her, but felt it was only proper to include him, even though what I thought would happen happened.

The full version is looong, so if you don’t want to read that here’s the short version: Fiance and I were having an adult conversation, Roommate gets riles thinking I’m attacking her, get super emotional, and rattles of a list of things that I don’t do around the house that to him implies I don’t care about the house (revolving predominantly around cleaning), therefore he and Fiance and do what they want. Now, I do care about what goes on at the house; I would think that mere act of say “you need to ask first” indicates I have some desire to be involved in house-related decisions.

Besides, I own half, he owns half, if I did truly want to do nothing to the house, that would be my prerogative to vote that way: we agreed on that when we moved in. We’ve reached consensus now, and resolved most of the issues, but since this is my place to vent, I’ll include the additions I thought but didn’t speak, as I didn’t think they’d be productive to the point at hand: communication. Anyway, what follows is the long version.

“So, when Roommate and I bought this house,” I begin, slowly and deliberately, purposefully letting her hear me breath calmly, “we set out a few ground-rules. One was that anything we wanted to do to our bedrooms was fair game and to be taken care of independently, but that anything in the common areas needed to be agreed upon. I know that your improvements to the house stem from the best of intentions – and the results look fantastic – but you need to ask first. And when you asked me last night to vacate the house for three days so strangers could stay in my bed, I didn’t really know how to respond. I wanted to have an adult conversation driven by rationality, not emotion, so I slept on it. I have to tell you that I’m not comfortable with that, and that it’s not acceptable to just inform me that the bridal shower would be here without asking me first. I’m not angry, I just want to have an adult conversation and make sure we’re communicating.”

“Well, first of all, the shower isn’t actually here. And I didn’t expect you to acquiesce, I was just asking, like the time when you offered to leave the house for a night after we got engaged.” Although internally I was thinking, you didn’t fuck in my bed, did you? Otherwise the two are totally different things, we were having the adult conversation I was hoping for: no drama, no bullshit and accusations, just making sure we’re on the same page.

“Okay, that’s my fault: it wasn’t clear to me that the shower wasn’t here. I should’ve asked for clarification. But I’m still uncomfortable with strangers in my bed.”

On other points, she was a little confused about what I was talking about, as she could only remember painting the dining room without asking, so I presented some examples as per her request: painting the bathroom and a piece of my furniture, lacquering some cabinets, removing art from the living room, etc. I cut it short as I didn’t want this conversation to be about lists and accusations, but she requested some, so I tossed out a few representative examples and left the rest as an exercise.

“I’m sorry about the dining room, but I figured, if you don’t like it I can always repaint it. I really thought the furniture was leftover from the old house, so I didn’t think to ask. And I know you and Roommate own this house, but I do live here and have and emotional investment, although not financial like you and Roommate, but I do want it to look prettier and recoup expenses.”

“And I’m totally down with that. Like I said, everything you’ve done looks great. I just don’t want to be left out of the decision making process. But, you’re both right and wrong regarding the furniture,” I say with a friendly smile, diffusing any rising anger, “it was left over from Roommate’s and my last house – it just happened to be my one of my leftover pieces. Like I said, no harm no foul, I just want to clear the air.”

And so on. A perfectly reasonable conversation. Both her and I admitting faults, setting the stage for resolution.

And this is where Roommate jumps in, like a father defending his cub. He launches into a diatribe of deficits regarding my household behavior, which although long, consists primarily of:

• I shouldn’t be attacking Fiance for attempting to improve the house.
• I don’t take in or out the trash can from the garage enough.
• I don’t clean my dishes often enough.
• I use the excuse that I’m not around enough to warrant participating in household cleaning chores.
• It takes too long to contact me to come to consensus; it’s faster if they just take the reigns and implement.
• I once left a dirty wine glass out for two weeks.
• I once stepped in a puddle from an over-watered plant in the foyer and didn’t clean it up.
• I don’t demonstrate that I’m interested in the ongoings of the house.
• I don’t clean up my stack of mail.
• I leave the back door open but the front door double locked.
• I don’t notice things around the house.
• He pays more of the mortgage than me.
• Therefore I forfeit rights to decision making processes regarding the house.

This was not a short rant, and most of the above was repeated at least three times. I let him finish, since he was quite emotional and I didn’t want to get into an argument, I wanted to have a discussion. Interrupting would have only made him angrier. However, he’d now incited Fiance, who added:

• I only gave her credit once for any of her home improvements.
• I have no emotional attachment to the house.
• I put no emotional energy into house.

My first response was to try to diffuse the situation by addressing them, calmly, together. “I just want to be absolutely clear: I’m not attacking Fiance. I just want to make sure that everything’s understood and we’re on the same wavelength. And Fiance, I was 99.9% sure that I had complimented every single thing you’ve done here, and if I haven’t, I’m sorry, and I’m saying it now: it looks great.” I also make some offhand comments (bad mistake) regarding him generally leaving and coming home earlier than I, so of course the he’d have the first opportunity to take in and out the trash, and that I may not have seen the puddle, hence I wouldn’t have cleaned it up. I was trying to turn the conversation back around to communication regarding changes to the house when Roommate turns it back to his “list.”

“It’s not just that, I have a whole list that I could go into. It’s that you don’t seem to care what happens to this house, so I have more leverage. If you’re not going to join in, then it’s up to us to make decisions. You’ve shown this.”

Fuck. And no one says, “I have a list,” unless they want to argue points, not have a discussion, or else they really don’t have a list. He never got past the above, he only repeated it more emphatically. I’ve got a list too, but I’m not going to bring it up at this juncture. I want to resolve this, not argue validity of individual points.

“Okay, it’s my fault then that I haven’t communicated enough interest in the ongoings of this house. That’s my fault. But I’m telling you right now, I am emotionally and financially invested in this place. When we moved in, we went and selected new lighting (which I installed) we chose colors to paint the living room, and decided how to arrange furniture, I bought the coffee table and credenza after consulting you, all that good stuff. Sometime after then, I stopped being consulted. When you guys painted the living room, I was out of town that weekend and you didn’t inform me you were even planning on doing it then. So of course I couldn’t help. But I’m letting you know now that I do want to be consulted.” You’d think this would be common sense.

Fiance queries, “How are you emotionally invested? You only stay in your room.”

“How? It’s my house. It’s where I live and sleep.”

“But you don’t hang out here. I mean, I now you’re not here as much and Roommate and I, how do you have any attachment? I’d feel terrible if you felt pushed away because we’re here so much.”

“Fair enough. But I do have an attachment, a lot has happened to me here. And it’s not your fault; I’m busy and I get home late. But you’re right to a degree: the dining room became your office, and I don’t use the kitchen much – although I would appreciate a bit more space in it, as I do go shopping occasionally (while you guys live in there) – and when I get home, you and Roommate are generally watching a program or movie (that I don’t want to see), so I’m no going to interrupt. So I go to my room; there’s no room for me left down here. But it’s still my home.”

We plod on for a while, eventually settling into some sort of “tell me what’s bothering you, and I’ll try to fix it” sort of consensus. Which is good.

I just want to address a couple of points here online, since they wouldn’t have led the conversation in the direction of communication, but would’ve started placing blame – exactly what I didn’t want to do. But here I have the advantage of doing that. So, here’s the down-low:

• I shouldn’t be attacking Fiance for attempting to improve the house. (I wasn’t, I said this multiple times, and I kept my voice calm, cool and collected, so there should be no indication that I was.)
• I don’t take in or out the trash can from the garage enough. (See above. Furthermore, if I haven’t put a single thing into the kitchen trash can in the last week, not only am I not going to think about taking out the trash, but there’s no reason I should. I’m willing to admit there’s been a few times I could’ve taken in the trash can from outside and didn’t – and a few times I have when I could’ve – but since I generally get home past 11 PM and Roommate’s already done it, I think this is moot. He latched on to the times I didn’t.)
• I don’t clean my dishes often enough. (Ok, on the rare occasion I eat at home, I’ll frequently leave my dish in the sink overnight – but the plan is to clean it the next day, but I can’t do that if you clean it in the morning. If you leave it, it’ll be done the next day. So yeah, I’ll take the blame on this one.)
• I use the excuse that I’m not around enough to warrant participating in household cleaning chores. (Yes, I do use this excuse when it’s valid. If I haven’t used the downstairs bathroom in a month, I feel no urge to clean it, especially when Roommate uses it regularly. Regarding the rest of the house, I had hired a house cleaner a few times – but we had a meeting and came to the conclusion it was too costly. Why do you think I hired a one? Because I’m not around to do such things often enough, perhaps? When the first time we split the cost, on the rest of the times I just paid for it all, because those times “not being around” wouldn’t be a valid excuse, so I didn’t try to use it as one?)
• It takes too long to contact me to come to consensus; it’s faster if they just take the reigns and implement. (I have a cell phone and email, which you’ve only used when responding to me, and have never initiated a conversation once since Fiance moved in.)
• I once left a dirty wine glass out for two weeks (Yup, I did, I totally accept this. But this in no way, in my mind, means you get control of the house. So I’ll take the blame on this as well.)
• I once stepped in a puddle from an over-watered plant in the foyer and didn’t clean it up (How many times have you seen me walking in or out of the house with the following bags: gym, camera, laptop, and backpack? You think there might be I change I didn’t see it? And not to mention the plant was not placed there by me, nor was I even asked if I wanted it there, nor is it my responsibility to water it, so what makes you think I would check to see if it hadn’t drained correctly?)
• I don’t demonstrate that I’m interested in the ongoings of the house. (Aside from: installing lighting, replacing locks, oiling hinges, replacing toilet seals, putting lights in the garage, carving a wine rack that holds all of your wine and none of mine, helping to choose paint colors and helping paint, volunteering to be the primary on the home loan, dealing with all the loan payments, spending endless hours discussing kitchen remodel options, shopping for appliances together, buying 90% of the furniture and 100% of the art for the house, requesting Ashley to paint some custom oils for the living room, spending countless hours searching for, contacting and interviewing all the contractors for the kitchen remodel, yielding my garage spot for all the construction materials for over a year, and consulting my father the real estate lawyer and uncle the building contractor for advice on both purchase and assessment, and asking to be queried on house-related decisions, no, I guess I’m not that interested.)
• I don’t clean up my stack of mail. (No, I don’t. I keep it in a neat stack. I may no go through it regularly, but I keep it in a stack. Your mail, however, is strewn all about the place.)
• I leave the back door open but the front door double locked. (Actually, I was pretty fastidious about locking the rear door, although I’m sure I missed some times. Just let me know when I do, and I’ll be more careful. And I believe you dislike the locking of the front door is because of the time I locked you out – but I was leaving, and you didn’t tell me you didn’t have keys on you. How am I supposed to know?)
• I don’t notice things around the house. (Yes, I do. I probably notice more about my environment that most people. I don’t see everything (like a puddle perhaps) but I see a lot. I see the crumbs build up on the coffee table from the last week’s worth of dinners you and Fiance have eaten there, whereas I’ve eaten nothing there. I see her laptop sundry constantly sitting out on the dining room table. I see her desk in the dining room messy and littered with paperwork while my one bag that was downstairs has been dumped in my room. I see the books of mine you move from their proper place downstairs to my room upstairs. I see the books entitled “What to Expect when you’re Expecting” and “The Expectant Father,” but I wait for you to bring up that announcement. I notice when you clean the fridge, because they’ll actually be room for me to put an item or two in there. I notice that my milk, that I’ve used for one bowl of cereal, is nearly empty, because you mistakenly believe that everything in the fridge is yours. I notice that after the kitchen remodel, you co-opted all my cabinets because I have moved my dried and canned goods back in there yet. I notice the new plants that go in here and there that I’m not going to water because I didn’t put them there, nor was a consulted. I notice when you take my photos off the fridge after a week and replace them with yours that hang indefinitely. I notice that the grass in the front yard has died, but I don’t bring it up to you, as it’s not you responsibility; it’s the groundskeeper’s. Yeah, I notice shit. So cut me some slack when I miss one or two things.)
• I only gave her credit once for any of her home improvements (Bullshit, but I ate this point for the sake of harmony. I remember distinctly every time she made an improvement, and I remember sincerely complimenting her on each one she made that I appreciated – which was not all of them, but it was a great deal more than once.)
• I have no emotional attachment to the house (See above.)
• I put no emotional energy into house. (Incorrect. However, doing this is at my discretion, not doing it does not mean I own less of the house.)
• He pays more of the mortgage than me. (Nope, you don’t. You just think you do. We each pay exactly half, and Fiance pays us a very small amount of rent. Just because she pays it to you, but she doesn’t have the money for it so you pay her rent for her, and then you pass along half of that payment to me when your paying me your half of the mortgage, that doesn’t mean you pay more. You did backtrack on this quickly, though, after seeing my facial expression when you claimed this, so I’ll give you that, but in your mind, I think you still think you have a greater claim to the house. Wrong.)
• Therefore I forfeit rights to decision making processes regarding the house (Fucking bullshit. The only way I relinquish rights is if someone buys me out.)

I can’t wait to sell.