Buckle up, folks. Iβve got a lot to say on thisβ¦
Iβm not one of those guys who subscribes to the βMan Caveβ idea. That theory that once youβre in a relationship, youβre required to forfeit 99% of your own home and be grateful to have one room in which you can be yourself and have your own possessions on display. I think if youβre in a relationship, you have a right to make your home reflect your personality and interests as much your partner does. Iβve run into a couple of instances where a woman thinking a man has no right to his own possessions has not gone over so well and it was hysterical.
I once knew a guy who worked in the telemarketing department of a company I worked at. One Friday night after work, he told me about how he ended up breaking up with his girlfriend.
This guy was like me, very clean and orderly and liked things a certain way but he wasnβt volatile about it or anything. He and his girlfriend decide to have a weekend sleepover at his house, a trial run in his mind for moving in together. She showed up and the red flags sprang up immediately. βWhereβs your bag?β he asks. βFor a weekend? I donβt need one.β she says. His mind reels. βSo youβre not gonna change clothesβ¦or showerβ¦or brush your teethβ¦?β βNo. Why would I do that in just a couple of days?β He tries to be okay about it but then she starts βcookingβ and the kitchen looks like a war zone. Then thereβs the fact that her B.O. seems to get stronger by the hour.
The last straw comes towards the end of the weekend when she walks around his place, eyes his Elvis Presley memorabilia collection and says βIf I lived here, all this Elvis shit would get set out for trash, Iβm not wasting space on all that.β When it finally comes time for her to go back home, she says βThis was fun! Canβt wait to do it again.β βYeah, about thatβ¦β and he dumped her in his own driveway.
He said if he had to choose between hygiene and an Elvis collection heβs built for years and her, heβs gonna be happier being single, cleaner and having his collectibles around than he would be with her.
Another instance happened when I had a garage sale and one of the things I was selling was a talking football player action figure from the 90s that someone had bought me under the presumption that because I was boy, I was into sports (I was not). The action figure was brand new in the box because that was how little I cared about playing with it despite my motherβs best attempts. A woman shows up, sees the action figure and loses her shit.
βOh God, I am so sick of seeing these! My husband has the whole set and all I want to do is throw them in the trash!β A guy at the sale overhears this and says βWell, Iβm sure your husband has a list of things that heβd like to get rid of that youβre partial to but he doesnβt say anything because thatβs the give and take of being in a relationshipβ She blows him off and says βI should be the one to decide what goes in the house and what he can buy, THAT is how marriage works for ME.β The guy changes his argument. βMaybe on your husbandβs list of shit that needs to go, you should be at the top of the listβ¦β Everyone else at the garage sale (including me) was now watching silently and wondering when the throw down would happenβ¦
βWhat did you say?β, she asks him a bit taken back. βI said if I was him, I wouldnβt take that shit that somehow being married to you means forfeiture of my belongings and personality and substituting it all for your bullshit. Iβd sooner throw you out than my action figures.β After picking her jaw up off my driveway, the woman hurumphs and storms back to her car. I high-five the guy for making an excellent point after she leaves.
I have a lot of collectibles myself and am currently in the creative habit of going through my childhood Power Rangers and PokΓ©mon toys and putting the ones I absolutely want to keep in shadow boxes and hanging them on the wall as conversation pieces and selling the rest.
I have Funko Pops. I have lunchboxes. I have special edition magazines and comic books in floater frames on the wall. I have more books than I have time to count or read. I have tub after tub of Halloween and Christmas decorations because thatβs my favorite time of year. I would never throw all of this stuff away because Iβve purged plenty already and kept what I wanted to keep. Itβs all a reflection of my personality and my story. If someone came into my life and said our life together would mean giving all of this up and doing what he wanted, I would consider that a toxic situation and I would end it before I got in too deep.
Men, gay or straight, can find themselves in toxic, abusive relationships, this is not a phenomenon only experienced by women. It just seems that way because men, especially straight men, rarely speak up about it and mistakenly settle on what they assume is some unchangable default result of being in a relationship. Itβs not.
I would never move in with someone and tell them to throw everything out that has been a part of them or spoken to who they are in order to make room for me. I am all about organizing and making a space feel cozy, functional and fun and would go out of my way to make sure we both had space for our things and our personalities and stories. One does not have to overshadow or overpower the other in order to make a relationship between two people work.
So, the next time someone says βItβs me or the Star Wars action figures on that one shelf that arenβt bothering anyone but I hate that that shelf isnβt all about me anywayβ say βMay The Force not hit you in the ass on the way outβ as you show them the door.
