I finally got a response from someone in Baka on one of the apartment
hunting groups on Facebook. In addition, a friend had gotten me in
touch with a friend of hers who was looking for a third roommate. I
took a day off from work and went to visit both places, which
happened to be in a 10 minute walking distance from one another. The
first place was a really nice apartment, big kitchen, clean, big
bedrooms. The woman living in the apartment seemed friendly enough,
but didn’t seem too thrilled with the idea of a cat. The deal
breaker was keeping the litter box in my bedroom. Truthfully there
wasn’t enough room in the bathroom for a litter box anyway, but no
one wants to sleep with a toilet in the room next to them. And litter
has a tendency to get EVERYWHERE. Which is fine when you can just
sweep it up from the bathroom floor every few days. But now imagine
finding it in your shoes, and in your bag, and in your bed, and in
your socks. It turns into living in a sand box which has been pooed
in. That was not what I had imagined when I pictured leaving the nest
for a world of exciting new adventures. At no point did brushing cat
litter out of my hair every morning figure in to the picture.
Although to be totally truthful, I didn’t so much as leave the nest
as fall out of the nest onto my face. But the last thing I need is to
fall onto my face into a pile of used cat litter.
The second place I went to to visit was in Mekor Chaim, behind the
Hadar Mall. The place was 3 flights up with no elevator, but I do
that ascent every day at work just to wake me up and get some
exercise. The two guys living there were looking for a roommate after
their previous one got married. The old lease was up at the end of
July, and they needed someone to move in August 1st (which
was the next week). They seemed like pretty laid back guys. The
kitchen was big and functional and both guys cooked. They seemed a
bit wary of living with a cat, and I wasn’t sure how they felt
living with a female since they were both religious. They had agreed
to meet me though, so there was hope. I on the other hand required a
place where I could bring Johnny and where there was a kosher
kitchen, and no smoking. I have pretty low standards, what can I say.
Incidentally, I had written a message to one of the guys who had
posted the apartment on one of the many Facebook groups I had been
thrust into, but had not gotten a response. I didn’t discover that
this was the same apartment until after setting up a meeting with
them.
To my surprise, I got a text message that Thursday evening that the
room was mine if I was still interested. And thus, we had a match
born out of desperation. One of the guys had never lived with a woman
before and the other had been married for 5 years and so had some
experience (though how good that experience was I can’t say). I did
live with a male roommate in Talpiot, along with a 39 year old Polish
woman (actually they were both Polish) and her dog (who was not
Polish but understood many languages due to the variety of
nationalities of the woman’s friends). Frankly the dog was the best
roommate I’ve ever had (aside from literally eating my homework one
afternoon), but the only demands she made on me was my dinner and a
belly rub now and then. The guy was in the army at the time though so
I saw him for a total of maybe an hour or two a week, since he came
home Thursday night or Friday and I went back to Ma’ale Adumim for
shabbat. I only stayed in the apartment twice over shabbat and one of
those times the electricity shorted 5 minutes after shabbat started.
That was a very dark shabbat. So it would be a new experience for me
as well. I couldn’t see that it would make much difference though
since it’s not like I walk around naked or anything. And I tend to
get along better with guys anyway, since there’s always less drama.
Which brings to mind a particular scene at a female friend’s place,
when her new (23 year old) roommate announced that she had invited 2
guys over after lunch. We’re like, “ok, cool.” The friend had
invited a bunch of people over after lunch anyway for games and such.
The roommate proceeded to tell us why this was a HUGE problem (all
while twirling her hair around a finger) because she invited the
first guy over, whom she’s not into, but now maybe he thinks she’s
into him, but she’s really into the second guy she invited, but she
doesn’t know if he’s into her, and maybe he’ll think she’s
into the first guy, and so on. The rest of us in the room just stared
at her, failing to comprehend where the problem lied, and why she
required alcohol to deal with two guys she’d invited over after
lunch. I commented, that I couldn’t remember being like that when I
was young, and my friend promptly replied, “you weren’t.”
So the next week saw me moving in my two carloads of stuff (ok, some
of it was Johnny’s) and carrying it all up 3 flights of stairs with
the much appreciated help of my dad. Johnny adjusted fairly quickly
and was happy to be the sole feline in the house (and supreme ruler
of the apartment which is what happens when a) you’re a cat; b)
you’re a 10 kg cat). All that was left was to get some additional
furniture and for my roommates to adjust to having a cat in the house
(which Johnny didn’t make easy owing to the shower curtain incident
and his formerly unknown love of challah). But these are stories for
another day.
