I have been thinking more and more about living space, and how it affects our lives. This is mostly because I’ve run out of drawer space for my winter hoodies, but also because I read a fantastic book about how liminal spaces (the bits of space which separate other bits of space, like doorways) in the Victorian age were used for all sorts of naughtiness, and now believe that the Victorians spent all their time having illicit encounters on trains, which I imagine to be exactly like the time I opened a train loo door and surprised two teenagers, only with longer dresses, and the toilet properly hiding its shame with a specially fashioned doily.
Also with less swearing. Teenagers are surprisingly territorial about the places they have sex in. I felt most unwelcome.
I have been spending lots of time in other people’s living space; June and July having passed in a happy haze of weddings and country weekends. Last weekend I was in a tremendously nice house, and realising on the train down that there were enough bedrooms for us all, I began to lobby to share a room. Sharing a room is one of life’s most underrated pleasures.
Room-sharing means having someone to entertain you whilst you fall asleep (simply ask the odd question, and most people will talk happily for ages, providing a free bedtime story service), and someone to convince to be late to breakfast with you, so you don’t look like the only lazy layabout, and just generally a nice chum to lounge about with, and answer any pressing questions you may have in the middle of the night. It is for this reason that I am planning on sharing my little sister’s bedroom for the rest of the year. That, and I’ve turned my own room into a large-scale hoody warehouse.
unfashionablylost 