There are days when I am overwhelmed with love for my tiny apartment. And then there are days when I’m feeling less enthusiastic about my life, letting my home get cluttered and dusty. Luckily, today was one of the good days. I did two loads of laundry, I went grocery shopping, and I even mopped my floors. I also did the dishes (which is my least favorite chore ever) and ordered sushi for dinner. I love it when my place is clean and everything is shiny. This was made better by the fact that my building is clean now, too. My landlord has been busy de-cluttering the halls and fixing broken things.
I’ve always liked my building: it was part of the reason I fell in love with the apartment. It’s a brownstone rowhouse whose stoop had been removed some time ago (which is a shame) on a tree-lined block. Inside, each floor is painted a different color, starting with a deep purple on the first floor and ending with bright orange on the fourth (my!) floor. There are mirrors and art in the halls, and a taxidermy bull’s head mounted on the second floor. On my floor, there’s a plant for which I’m responsible hanging under the skylight, which provides lots of natural light. The building is a semi-detached house, with a driveway and a garage (which is where the landlord lets me store my bike — lucky!). Tenants are not allowed up on the roof but that’s OK because I have no interest in going up there.
The downside to living in a pre-war building, though, is that my apartment never feels clean. There’s no central air so dust just settles in every nook and cranny. And my cat doesn’t help, either: his fur is on everything. I got an air purifier to help circulate the air and filter out the germs & bacteria. It helps but what I really need to do is set up a strict cleaning regime and stick to it.
