The Walkthrough Closet

There was a time after college where I lived in an efficiency apartment in a historic building from around 1900. It had a beautiful facade and an open lobby with a visible staircase and one, narrow elevator. The elevator had an old diamond pattern sliding door that you had to manually open and close. The elevator was very slow - about as slow as taking the stairs. It vibrated enough that it would often cause that gate to open a bit, causing the elevator to stop. You learned to hold a foot against the gate after it was jarred loose and stopped you between floors a few times.

The halls were narrow, as were the doors. It has steam heat and radiators that would knock loudly, and on cold nights the regulator valve would hiss like an angry snake or dissatisfied theater goer all night long. The single pane, metal sash, casement windows radiated cold in the winter and let bugs in during the summer due to a lack of screens.

The single room had a tiny four burner stove with an oven too small for a full sized cookie sheet. The sink was about half the normal size, and there was one cabinet below the sink, a narrow cabinet with a drawer bedside it, and one overhead cabinet above. And then there was the walkthrough closet. Yes, you read the right, a walkthrough closet. One room of the wall contained double doors that swung opened into the main room, and exposed the closet. On both sides there was a rod to hang clothes. If you walked the four feet to the back of the closet, there was a narrow door on your right that led to a bathroom that shared a wall with the tiny kitchenette.

The bathroom had a toilet, a super tiny sink, and a stand-up shower so narrow that I was constantly whacking my elbows when I would shampoo my hair. You literally had to turn sideways to get between the sink and the shower if you wanted to access the toilet. 

It was my first apartment. It was incredibly small, there was no parking lot or garage, and street parking was a nightmare to find. It cost 3/4 of all of the money that I made a month in rent. But it was mine and mine alone. I borrowed my grandmother's sewing machine, bought some remaindered sheets at a discount store, and made some curtains for those windows. Both for aesthetics, and to keep the cold out. I furnished it from Goodwill or donations from friends and family. I had a futon in the place of a bed. 

There was a clarinetist who lived three doors down the hall. She clearly played professionally for a symphony, so my weekend afternoons were often filled with classical music and scales. So many musical scales. 

I lived there for 18 months before moving into a two bedroom apartment with a roommate. While it wasn't the best or the cleanest or the nicest apartment building, I still have fond memories of the apartment, and of my life during that time, including Beth, Jenna, Candy, Yvonne, and Rachel, but those are stories for another time.