The Problem Roommate and Me Being a Slow Learner

I'm a slow learner. Let's just get that out there right now. At least for things related to my ongoing mental health. When you read the following and marvel at how it keeps going, remember that and be a little more understanding than normal.

There's a guy I've known since the Holt days. We'll call him GS. And he has taken advantage of my good graces for a long time, Mostly in a passive-aggressive way that allows him to get his digs in, but not quite enough for me to finally wash my hands of him. Here are two stories that will sum it up. I need to tell you these two stories so you can understand current events.

Tale #1

Many years ago – probably when we were both in our 20s, GS engaged in a really irritating behavior to get a rise out of me. He's grab my knee. And when I say that, I mean in a full-on under-the-table-with-a-date-hoping-to-get-lucky way.

Aside: I have no idea what his gender identity or preferences are. They long ago got categorized into none-of-my-business, and not-my-problem.

I didn't like it, and because it got a reaction out of me, he'd keep doing it. And so, over a span of a year, I'd tell him not to do that. Or I'd ask him nicely not to do that. Or I'd take him aside and explain to him, like a grown-up, using my words, how much this behavior upset me and made me feel uncomfortable, so pretty please with sprinkles, don't do it. I'd yell at him, or order him not to do it. Sometimes it would work for one or two social gatherings, but always, he'd do it again.

Finally, we were at a party and he squeezed my knee.

“The next time you do that, I will punch you in the leg as hard as I can.”
“Oh, ha ha.” squeeze.

And I punched him as hard as I could in the leg. It was the kind of punch that would go through a wall easily, and I aimed it straight at the middle of the rectus femoris.

He yelled in pain and clutched his thigh.

“You didn't have to do that!”
“Apparently, I did.”

The result was him limping for the rest of the night, and sulking for a month; but he never did it again.

Tale #2

GS liked to snort when he laughs. And this wasn't an involuntary snort, it was a deliberate effort to call attention to itself, like “ha ha ha” pause long enough for you to notice the pause… “snort”. And when I told him it annoyed me, he made an extra effort to do it all the time.

Now this was less annoying than the knee-squeezing, but it also went on a lot longer.

It really pissed me off. Especially when I realized he did it expressly to piss me off.

Now this is one of those things that I find hard to articulate. After all, it's just a noise, and shouldn't I just ignore it? All I can tell you is that I know the difference between random irritating habits, and a deliberate effort to get on my nerves.

As with the knee-squeezing, I ran through the gamut of responses from ignoring it, to asking nicely, to flat out ordering. Punching him wasn't on the table, since this wasn't a physical violation. This went on for years.

Finally, I'd had enough. He was hanging out at my apartment and let out a particularly loud snort.

“Get out.”
“What?”
“You heard me. Get out, and don't come back until you're ready to knock that shit off.”

He left in a huff, and I didn't see him again for over a year.

I got admonished by my roommate for my reaction, but he didn't contradict me, or invite him over after that. And no, I didn't overreact.

When I saw him next, and for many years later, he never* snorted in my presence again.

Anyway, the point of these two tales is to demonstrate that some people will only respond to the nuclear option.

*never say never.

The Problem Roommate, part two.

GS moved to Edmonton for a few years to work, then ended up coming back to Calgary to work at a high-end hotel. Sometime around then I bought my house, and he ended up couch surfing because he didn't have a place to stay.

• I let him stay until he could get back on his feet.
• At some point, someone moved out, so I let him use that room, instead of the literal couch.
• He got accepted into ACAD, and I let him stay until he graduated.
• Then he couldn't get a job, and he entered UofC and got a Masters degree, and I let him stay until he graduated.
• Then he couldn't get a job, and he got a second Masters, so I let him stay until he graduated.
• Then he couldn't get a job, until he did, but now he couldn't move because the job takes up so much time.

Etc. Etc. What was always supposed to be a temporary situation until he could get back on his feet ended up being a 15 year tenancy. Remember when I said I was a slow learner?

He was planning on getting a Doctorate, which would have been great, because that would have required moving. But that didn’t happen.

Which brings us to now.

One thing you have to know about GS is that he's a hoarder. Given enough time, and no push back from others, his crap will spread out from his space to take up everything else in the house. Like a sort of kudzu made out of note paper, vintage luggage, computer components, and random art supplies.

GS objects to my classifying him as a hoarder. To that I say:

1. He is unable to throw things away, because of their perceived value, even when the actual value is nothing.
2. Areas of the house where his kudzu have taken over can no longer be used for their intended purpose.

So while the area might not be full of old newspapers and mason jars of urine, he's certainly well on his way. And this has been a major contentious issue with us.

I've suggested he clean it up, because it's in the public areas of the house. I've asked him nicely. I've pulled rank and ordered him to clean up. Is any of this sounding familiar?

For years, I've not been able to use my living room. The maids have to vacuum around the piles of crap. He'll say “I'll see what I can do”, which is occasionally cleaning off the table, or moving a pile.

Somewhere along the way, he really started to resent me. I became aware of this a few years ago when he started snorting again. He’d do it very occasionally, but it would always be deliberate, with just enough deniability that I wouldn’t call him on it. In retrospect, that was probably when he decided we weren’t friends anymore. Also, that was the point where I went from thinking “I wish this guy would just move out already” to “I should really kick him out”. Of note, this was also when requests to clean up his mess were simply ignored. Oh, he’d “see what he could do”, but now nothing would happen at all.

As for the snorting, I decided to fight passive-aggressiveness with passive-aggressiveness. Namely, whenever he snorted, I’d change the topic to something he didn’t like.

“…and the bear said, ‘you’re not in this for the hunting’. Ha ha!” *pause* *snort*.
“So I was wondering when you were going to pay back that two grand you owe me?”

He later adapted to this, and would only snort if there was a third person around.

COVID meant I had to spend a lot more time around him. And his mess. Plus, he needed space to work on his latest art project, so he turned a table in the garage into his workspace. And the kudzu spread there. About a third of my garage ended up being his crap. Now I had a whole new space I couldn't use for it's intended purpose.

Which brings us to current events.

I went on a trip to the left coast recently. As I was packing my car, GS came out to get in his car and go for his morning coffee. Since I was going to be gone for two weeks, I figured this would be a good time to ask again.

“Have a good trip.”
“Thanks. While I’m gone, I want you to clean up all of your stuff in the living room.”
*pause* “Well, I’ll see what I can do, but only because you said ‘your stuff’, and not ‘your *shit*’. I don’t like you belittling my belongings by calling it ‘shit’, so I didn’t feel I should have to before.”
*me stunned*
“Anyway, you have a good trip” *rushes to his car and drives away before I have time to process what I just heard.*

And then I was angry.

So I finished packing the car, and I wrote him the following message:

Well you left me gobsmacked this morning, and I couldn’t respond the way I should have.

I thought about what you said. I think what’s worse than living with a hoarder is the idea that you’ve been deliberately living like this because of some perceived slight based on my tone and language. As if you shouldn’t keep the public spaces clean because it’s the right thing to do. Without me asking at all.

What’s really upsetting is the idea that you would live like this - for years - to teach me a lesson.

I am tired of this. I am tired of living in a shit hole. So here’s what’s going to happen: You’re going to clean up, and keep it clean (and this goes for the garage too), or I’m evicting you.

I turned off my computer, got in the car and left. Ended up having a decent visit with folks over the next two weeks, too.

Aside: Whenever I would talk about GS to my friends, and especially during this trip, everyone had the same advice: He is taking advantage of you, just evict the guy already. And I'd always think, “well, he'd be homeless if it weren't for me, I can't evict him.” Except that's not true. I mean, an arts degree isn't useless. And he also has a STEM degree, so he could get a job programming easily. And he's got a boatload of tech skills and experience in hospitality. Literally the only thing stopping him from getting a job was his unwillingness to get a job that wasn't art related - specifically his art.

As I was driving back to Calgary, it occurred to me that I was hoping that he wouldn't clean up the kudzu. So I'd have a reason. No such luck – when I came into the house, I discovered that not only had he cleaned up the living room, he had removed every one of his belongings from the room. Including his X-Box, and the art on the walls!

Ok, fine. As long as it's clean.

But he was super sulky about it, and was largely giving me the silent treatment. He had bitched to my uncle (who has been doing renos in the house), and the other roommate, while I was gone though. Roommate stayed out of it; uncle told him to grow up.

A few days after I got back from the trip, I was returning from a bike ride and he was working in the garage.

“We really need to talk about things. It's going to upset you.”
“Go ahead.”
“Oh, not now; you're working and I don't want to mess your day up.”

Whatever. I've no desire to have an upsetting conversation. I wasn't about to genuflect to him to get one - he could see me whenever he wanted.

A few days go by. I get a text.

“I'm still waiting to have that conversation.”
“So what's stopping you?”

He comes down to my office, angry and ready for a confrontation, and I'm just done.

“So I have to get summoned to the principal's office if I want to talk to you?”
“So talk.”
“Do you know how much of a disruption to my life having to clean out the living room was? Why? Why was it so important to you? And giving me only two weeks? When I should have been working on my project.”
“I didn't give you two weeks – I've been asking you to clean up your mess literally for years. As for why, I don't want to live with a hoarder.”
“I'm not a hoarder!”
“I believe you are.”
“What's the definition of a hoarder?”
“I'm not having a debate with you.”
“Well I can see you're just hearing, not listening, so FUCK YOU.”

He storms off. The switch in my head gets flipped, and a decision is made.

I finish my work day, and then I start researching. The goal: Can I evict GS legally? Turns out he had nary a legal avenue to turn to. As a tenant sharing public areas with the landlord, the Residential Tenancy Act didn't apply. Since I don't rent out to anyone who shows up at my door, the Innkeepers Act also didn't apply. And since there was no contract, either written or verbal, he had no civil solution. I could have changed the locks the next day if I'd wanted to. But I try not to be a monster. I write up two formal notifications that I'm terminating his tenancy. The short one of which will be for the end of September, and the second one is for the end of November (because I know he has two months left on his contract, and I don't want to derail his job). I'll serve one of them before the beginning of September, so both are valid under the rules of the Residential Tenancy Act, even though they didn't apply.

August 28th, I confront him.

“I no longer want you living with me. You have two choices: One month, or, if you're willing to be civil while you're here, three months.”
“Well one of us is willing to be civil.”
“Ok, that's the sort of passive-aggressive bullshit that I'm talking about. I don't care if you never speak to me again, but I don't want you snarking at me. I certainly don't want you taking it out on the other roommate. So let me ask again: one month, or three months?”
“Three months.”

I hand him the written notification and leave.

I wasn't too happy about that, because I didn't really want to deal with living with a storm cloud for three months. Turns out I didn't have to. Within a few days, GS started moving his stuff out. A few car loads at a time, but it was steady. About a week ago he stopped sleeping here. Today, all of his stuff was gone, and he left an envelope with nothing but my name on it and the house key inside. Oh, and a bunch of debt that I'm going to write off.

I'll likely never see him again. Given we haven't really been friends since the snorting restarted, and me only realizing that on my trip, I'm OK with that. Still, I wish it had ended differently – for example, with him being a casual acquaintance who lived with me for a year or two in the distant past.

I'm probably not going to rent out the room unless someone I know is in dire straits. In a few years when the other roommate leaves, I'll sell the place and downsize. Pepperland is big enough that a family should really live here.