DAY 21: UTTER RANDOMNESS

Colour key: green = utterly random

The last 12 months of living alone have been filled with utterly random moments that take me (often unpleasantly) by surprise. There are of course the bigger certainties that we’re well aware of before signing that first lease: paying triple the amount of rent that seems reasonable, getting used to going out less, spending Saturday mornings washing dishes instead of sleeping in and, of course, feeding yourself or flirting with malnutrition.

These are all certainties, so they hardly took me by surprise. But there are a bunch of smaller, random chores and events that take place just after you move out that leave you feeling upset, angry, unprepared, frustrated, tangled, in pain and sometimes, all-out mortified.

Like the first time I used a washing machine unaided. Even though I had been surrounded by these machines for over 20 years, I never really took note, but I was convinced that a single wash couldn’t possibly exceed 30 minutes. So that first time, when the machine was still at it over an hour later, I frantically stopped it, fearing an explosion - naturally, I spent the next 20 minutes wringing out a sopping wet load of washing by hand.

Then, there was the case of the blocked drain. Few things invite me to barf more readily than a blocked drain. My first thought was that I needed a plumber immediately. Thank goodness I Googled it first, and a R38 can of Caustic Soda later, this one turned out to be an easy fix. Cleaning the inside of a microwave and a fridge was rather random, and that piece of counter under the microwave regularly haunts me (spending another 5 minutes to clean it as regularly as the rest of the countertop rarely seems worth it). But these pale in comparison to taking down heavy curtains to have them washed, and then replacing them – that ordeal was beyond bleak.

I’ve also done some astonishingly dumb, embarrassing and random things over the past year, and these all fall into the ‘all-out mortified’ category. The first one was attempting to put a mini oven/stove into a cupboard whilst standing on a stool – the fact that I am still here to share the tale with you is a miracle. The fact that the oven is still here, in one piece, is even more of a miracle.

There was also the night after 11pm when I stood on a stool (clearly the common denominator when it comes to my dumb moments) that was balanced on a table, to change the bulb of the patio light, and all of it in the howling wind and rain.

And I can’t not mention the time, just before I bought a couch, where I needed to measure the width of the limited space I had available. Without a tape measure or even a ruler in sight, I used my 1,66m frame in a horizontal position, face-down, to measure the space available. If I were as tall as a regularly sized person, I might have come up with the wrong measurement entirely because I would have had to manoeuvre myself into a semi-foetal position. Still, my measurements turned out to be very accurate, and I even got over my fear of instruction manuals by assembling the couch myself.

For all their randomness and for all the frustration they’ve caused, I’m still thankful for these little foibles that mark life in your 20s. After all, thanks to that thing called trial and error, I have a couch that can comfortably be sat on, a drain that’s not holding on to anything and a far more trusting relationship with my washing machine.