Collective Dreams

What a fantastic life I have. I am so incredibly grateful for the wonderful people around me. A lovely long weekend ends with me receiving the sweetest compliment. We are sitting in the sauna, massaging and scratching each other's backs, when she says, “Why don’t we live together? Shall we move in together? You are one of the few people I would want to see every morning.” “Of course we should,” I say. It’s playful banter, but I would love to live in a collective with her.

I think about my years in collectives. Things that were rough have turned into funny stories and nostalgia. I remember the year in France, the international student dorm with 250 rooms that looked like prison cells. The first night, exhausted, lying on the bed and wondering what I had gotten myself into, I noticed dirty shoe prints on the ceiling (someone had been chasing mosquitoes with their shoe, I realized later). I remember the kitchens with overflowing sinks. No one cleaned; instead, you looked for the least dirty kitchen. On the way, you often met someone who had a carrot, an onion, a bit of cream, or something else (on one occasion frog legs), and suddenly you had a whole meal and dinner company. 

I remember that before France, I had a feeling that I would always be a little lonely, and I remember breaking down there from social overload and not being able to stop crying because I never got to be by myself.

I remember the student corridor in E-tuna, food that disappeared, intrigues, and loud guys who amused themselves by throwing out sofas with people sitting in them. I think fondly but not very often about the year with S and P, both more eccentric than I was (for once I got to feel like the most normal one).

I wonder what it would be like to live with several people again. Probably more hygienic and without testosterone-fueled young men throwing furniture, but certainly sometimes abrasive too. But I imagine it’s healthy to be rubbed the wrong way together with people. I do have wonderful people to be rubbed together with now as well, but not every morning.