Heaton Happenings

Recently I’ve moved out of my parents’ home into a shared student house with my best friend, about 10 minutes round the corner. It is an arrangement which began originally as a joke, both of us almost instantaneously sick and maladjusted to the unexpected return to our family homes. It is a struggle I think many teenagers, especially university students, will relate to. 

Whilst we accept that it comes from a place of privilege, to a degree we have still definitely had our freedom limited due to current circumstances beyond our control. I’ve heard many people I know complain about the switch from university accommodation in which they’d only just grown accustomed, to the family homestead. Having to be home for a certain time for tea, or not being able to meet up with whoever they want whenever they want. I’m not sure if the recent re-opening of bars and pubs worsens this lack of freedom or provides some sort of outlet for us, despite having to stumble home to slightly disappointed parents in the early hours of the morning. 

That being said, I’m extremely glad I made the decision to return home to my loving and fairly relaxed family, and small North-East city, rather than stay alone in my student accommodation. Upon a brief last visit to my student digs a few weeks ago to collect the rest of my belongings, my room had a musty unclean odour, and the disgustingly unkempt shared kitchen even had unidentifiable insects crawling about in non-perishable foods like rice?! The shared courtyard area eerily quiet save for the repetitive slap of a fellow student’s jump rope on the concrete. 

 Honestly I’m not quite sure how my mate and I got to the point of legitimacy in our current living arrangement but, since counting down from the very beginning of lockdown, it has thus far lived up to our expectations. Apart from further ensconcing ourselves into the stereotypical married lesbian couple, it’s been going really well. I’ve been informed that we’re not allowed to get a cat as that would only further our conformity to the aforementioned stereotype. That’s not to say I won’t keep sending my mate photos of cats from local shelters until she acquiesces. 

I feel it’s important to establish at this point that despite bickering as an old married couple, referring to each other as ‘the mrs’ and our respective sets of parents as ‘the in-laws’, we are not in fact romantically involved. Or maybe it’s not important at all, we’re enjoying ourselves and I think that’s the important thing. It feels in a way a practice for me. A glimpse of the student experience I hope to have in 3rd year, as this year I’ll be returning to halls, bright eyed and bushy tailed in a new university in a new city, dreading the concept of a shared student kitchen but eager to meet new people and actually enjoy my course in a place that sort of already feels like home. It also helps that it is close enough to my actual home that I can just catch a train and be back in Newcastle in a couple of hours if I feel anywhere near close to a mental breakdown, or several. Not to be dramatic or anything. 

Far from being a primary reason for our friendship, it would be a lie to say that the fact that both my best friend and I follow a vegan diet hasn’t made shopping and cooking arrangements unbelievably easy thus far. Not only that, but we always joke that out of all of our friends we are probably the most middle class as a result of our upbringings. There are times when I’ve been at hers and could probably list without even looking, all of the items in her fridge as they match exactly what’s in mine. Me and her mum text regularly to compare notes on the novels we’re reading or to send photos of coastal walks we’ve recommended to each other. 

In truth, each evening as we settle down to a platter of vegan cheese and crackers or maybe a fresh batch of home baked scones, the hellish images of skanky student houses that our parents endured couldn’t be further from our reality. In fact, this weekend we’re even hosting a dinner party, but don’t all students do that? To add insult to injury, my friend is currently trying to house some sort of plant oasis in the yard out back, ignoring the ground littered with the previous tenants’ abandoned joints and bottle tops. 

My residency here in our house in Heaton is temporary, I’m merely filling an empty room until the rest of my friend’s housemates move back from their family homes scattered across the country that they too had to prematurely flee to in order to escape the onslaught of corona virus. In September I plan on moving out again slightly further afield to Manchester. My mother keeps joking that this is a healthy transition, moving out for now but remaining in the same city so that moving out to Manny C will be easier. “Baby steps” she jokes. Although she says this humorously, I’d be lying if I didn’t admit to some truth in her words. 

The last couple of move-out attempts, first to a foreign country and then to the other end of England, resulting in my homesickness and eventual return to the nest in which I’ve been lovingly nurtured for 20 years. Although the latter was actually through no fault of my own and had it not been for Corona Virus and the urge for everyone to abscond central London, I’m sure I would have stayed at least until my first year of university and my flat tenancy ended. Probably. I’d always thought of myself previously as quite independent, it is only when my time to leave actually came that I realised how difficult it was to leave the place where I’ve always felt safe and loved. Nevertheless, we move. 

Anyway, it’s definitely nice to be able to pop home to see my parents for the occasional cuppa or home cooked meal without feeling the constraints of family responsibilities, or being told that there is such a thing as “too much wine” on a Tuesday. Ridiculous.