A House is Not a Home

I've just completed my first week in my first, very own apartment. It's a studio, with a maroon-tiled bathroom and a shower head that hovers over the sink. The few times I have showered in my own bathroom, it's been basically in the middle of the bathroom holding the shower head as to not have it spray out of control all over the toilet paper and the washer, but thankfully, I take most of my showers at the gym. Yes, my washer is inside the bathroom. And no, I haven't done my first load of laundry yet. And the rarely used kitchen is separated from the rest of the living area by a sliding, translucent door that I guess is supposed to create a barrier between the threatening odors of korean food and the rest of the house. The only odors that have crept out of the kitchen are those of the mountain dew cans, neatly lined up beside the sink. I've yet to take them down to the recycling bin outside. And then there's a floor that heats up when I want, and a bed that is positioned perfectly to have a view of the tv with no working remote. The remote actually just doesn't have functioning batteries, but I'm too cheap to go buy new ones.

As you can see, this studio that I would sell my soul to have at this price in New York City is little more than just a place that I can have some peace and quiet after a day of work. I remember being so determined to get a place of my own if I ever did return to Seoul, and now I've got it. I must admit that it is a bit lonely, and I often look at my Subway, McDonalds, or other unfortunate substitute for a home-cooked meal and I can't help but feel like something's amiss. I never envisioned my future as an independent to be riddled with big macs and take out. In fact, not even my summer in New York was reduced to that. That was because I didn't have any money, but I guess we won't go there. I came here chasing money and placing all my eggs in a basket full of middle schoolers. Middle schoolers. That toxic stage of adolescence when you're in the perpetual state of too cool and yet not cool enough. I suppose if I just sat down and thought about that, I would have known that it wouldn't be so much fun.

But it really isn't so bad. I've already had the class from hell and really, it couldn't get any worse (right?). It's just that at times when I'm sitting alone in my apartment, dreaming of what under-5-dollar meal I'll consume the next day, I kind of wish I was sitting on my bed at home, knowing that my dad is watching tv in his room, my brother is incessantly checking his myspace, my mom is rereading the Joel Osteen book, and that in the next few minutes, I'll feel the vibrations from the next plane landing at the airport near our house.