This past weekend, two of our best friends moved in with us. My husband and I have a wide array of friends, ranging from my artist girlfriends to his long-time colleagues to couples we hang out with on a regular basis. These particular friends of ours are a couple, and they occupy their own unique space in our world, where a stranger observing the four of us interacting would probably not be entirely sure who was married to whom. One afternoon, three of us went shopping for a couch for my husband and me, and I could tell our salesman was totally confused. Who was the couch for — the woman and this guy or that guy or was it for the two guys? I’m sure when we walked out of the store, receipt in hand and new couch ordered, he still did not know which one of us was coupled with the other and who was going to get to enjoy that new couch.

When these friends were suddenly out of a job and a home — because their jobs gave them a place to live as part of the package — there was no question they would move in with us while they looked for new employment. My husband and I had no discussion about it; the four of us did not sit down to set out rules or boundaries or timelines. They just moved in, and that was that. Last night we had our first dinner together as “roommates” and we toasted our good fortune — our home, a delicious meal, good music and each other. We all tried to watch a movie, but couldn’t stay awake, so we turned off the TV, said good night and went to bed, just like any other typical suburban household on Main Street, USA.

In conversations with other friends over the weekend, when I mentioned, “Our friends just moved in with us,” I experienced reactions that were one step short of shock and awe. I find this especially funny considering my husband and I run a bed and breakfast; friends from across the globe have stayed with us for weeks at a time and not a month goes by when we don’t have someone other than the two of us sleeping under our roof. The idea of this couple moving in for a while barely registered on our radar. The only thing we really need to consider is where to put all the other friends who booked their stays here long before our household increased by two. Other than that, having friends in the house is par for the course around here, and we wouldn’t have it any other way.

Perhaps the mortified reactions I got this weekend had to do with anxiety over how it feels to think about letting someone into our own little quirky worlds. For this to work, I have to be willing to let my friends see that I leave the kitchen a mess most mornings and I’m obsessive about laundry. I’ll see what brand of half and half they prefer, and they’ll have to listen to me practice piano. Considering I’ve only had four lessons in my entire life, this doesn’t mean they’re getting private piano concerts; they’re having to hear me muddle my way through “On Top of Old Smokey” a dozen times in a row. In sharing a home, we’re going to be exposing another layer of our lives and ourselves, and that isn’t easy with just anyone. I can’t say my husband and I would invite any of our friends to live with us if they were in the same situation; this decision was easy because it was these friends, and with these friends we have a foundation that makes this possible.

The four of us have seen each other in good moods and bad moods, in tears, in the midst of arguments with our respective partners, tired, jet-lagged, angry, tipsy, melancholy, giddy and grouchy. We call one another friends and our actions have backed this up from the day we met, and perhaps that is why our connection has been so consistently strong — all four of us, for our own reasons, believe in the power of our actions more than our words, and we strive to act according to what we say. Each of us has our own unique stories of loss, betrayal and grief, and through these experiences our integrity became important to us and we eventually found our way to each other. We can laugh as freely as we can because we know we can also cry when we need to; we trust each other because trust has been built through a thousand tiny moments where we made the choice to be there for each other no matter what.

Today, that means we live under the same roof, and our hearts will be all the richer for it.

2 Responses to “Creating a home”

1. Jamie Hergott Says:
   June 19th, 2009 at 12:33 pm

   Love this! My husband and I are also very open and willing to sharing our home and surprisingly enough, get weird reactions when we offer our guest room and extra space for renters.

2. amy Says:
   June 21st, 2009 at 1:53 am

   “trust has been built through a thousand tiny moments” .. such a beautiful expression of a lovely relationship.

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