The Room I Chose to Leave

Arriving too late

Years ago, a few weeks before school started, I returned to the city where I was studying.

Finding a place to live before classes began had become part of my routine.

I'd usually arrive, spend a day or two looking at apartment postings, and find a room without much trouble.

This year was different.

I'd left it too late.

Classes were about to start, and most of the good places were already gone.

For my first week, I rented a room in an old nurses' residence.

Rooms were rented by the week while people looked for something more permanent.

The old residence

I carried my suitcase up a wide, polished stone staircase.

The building still felt like what it had once been.

The hallway was dimly lit.

The walls were painted that faded institutional pink you used to see in older buildings.

There was a small sink in my room.

The toilets and showers were down the hall.

A wall phone hung in the hallway for everyone to use.

It wasn't home.

I was young.

That didn't bother me.

Everyone had a story

Most evenings, the men staying there gathered in the TV room.

I joined them.

Everyone seemed to have a story.

One young guy was in the city to take a forklift course.

When he finished, he was heading north.

"You can make big money up there," he said.

One night I came back with Chinese food.

The guys laughed.

"You know how much rice we could buy for what you paid for that?"

We all laughed.

The hallway phone

A few nights later, I was using the hallway phone when one of the men walked over.

He demanded to know who I was talking to.

Not asked.

Demanded.

My gut said, run.

Instead, I smiled.

"Just my mom," I said.

We talked for another minute.

Then I hung up and walked back to my room.

I remember looking at the chair and wondering if I should wedge it against the door.

I don't remember whether I actually did.

I remember sitting on the edge of the bed.

Every sound in the hallway suddenly seemed louder.

For the first time since I'd arrived, I was scared.

Enough to walk away

What frightened me wasn't what he said.

It was the feeling.

For a brief moment, it felt as though he thought I belonged to him.

It felt as though he was trying to figure out who I was before deciding what came next.

That was enough.

Right then and there, I knew I was leaving.

Until then, I hadn't stopped to think about what kind of place I was living in, or who I was living with.

The search

The next morning, I started the desperate search for somewhere else to live.

I didn't have a car.

I took the bus or walked from apartment posting to apartment posting.

Whenever I found a place that looked promising, I called the landlord or knocked on the door.

A few days later, on the other side of town, I found an old Victorian house that had been divided into student apartments.

There were shops on the main floor.

Students lived upstairs.

The bathroom was shared.

In the middle of it sat an old claw-foot bathtub.

The place wasn't fancy.

It felt safe.

The room I chose to leave

I've forgotten almost everything about that apartment.

I haven't forgotten the room I chose to leave.

That week taught me something no finance book ever could.

Savings buy the freedom to choose a different path.

I could leave because I had enough money to keep looking.

Enough to pay for another room.

Enough to walk away.

Not as the ability to buy more.

And the freedom to say no.

Not me, not today