The Interior Decorating Tastes of a College Sophomore

Welcome to installment #3 of Roommate Tales. Here we find our heroes in a 60's era shithole apartment with very little money and a ton of free time.

Elvis and I had just moved into a new apartment. This was the mid 1990's and we were broke college students. The rent at our last place was too high. It was a small two bedroom apartment a block away from campus (location, location, location). We were working minimum wage jobs while going to school full time, so we were able to cover rent and groceries but not much more than that.

Once the lease was up, we had only two real requirements in our apartment hunt. Rent had to be cheap and the place had to be within a short bike ride to classes. After walking through a few potential apartments, we finally found the perfect spot. The landlord didn't give a shit who we were or what we did, as long as we could cover the $360 per month rent. Yeah, that's right. We each paid $180 a month for a decent sized two-bedroom duplex with parking and a yard.

Elvis and I had one request for the landlord before we signed the lease. The place was a real dump. It was filthy and falling apart. So the agreement was this: We'd fix the place up ourselves, and any money we spent on materials would be deducted from the rent. Each month we ended up mailing in a very small check along with a pile of Home Depot receipts. The work week was full of classes and clocking hours at our jobs, while weekends were spent getting shitfaced and painting or hanging ceiling fans or putting down a new floor in the kitchen.

This is the point where we were able to make a few design decisions. Some made sense, others were the result of a case of beer, a couple of joints, and a severe lack of sleep. Here's an example: One late night around two or three in the morning, we had just finished laying new linoleum down in the kitchen. We thought it would be a great idea to hide a little message for future tenants. Sort of a home improvement practical joke.

It started when we moved the oven to scrape up the old linoleum. We realized the oven hadn't left that spot for decades. The floor under that appliance had a thick layer of dust, and the floor under the dust was its original color, untouched by years and years of sunlight. As we scraped away that old flooring, I thought of the Beck song I Get Lonesome from the album One Foot in the Grave. "Well there ain't nobody left to impress - And everyone's kissing their own hands - There's 666 on the kitchen floor - Ain't no fire in the pan - I get lonesome..."

"666 on the kitchen floor?" How very Helter Skelter. Drunk and high, it seemed like the funniest idea ever. After finishing the job in the kitchen, we took some red paint from another project and painted "666" and a pentagram on the floor where the oven belonged. We slid the appliance back into place and never mentioned it again. For all I know, our secret artwork remains undiscovered to this day.

But that was just the beginning. We had repaired all the little scuffs and dings around the apartment and put up a fresh coat of paint. That left us with a boring white apartment. Elvis decided it was time for something truly unique. He started with his bedroom.

Before I get into the details here, I want to clarify something. Elvis wasn't one of those weird artsy neo-hippie college kids. He wore a white t-shirt and jeans nearly every day, and had a normal looking haircut. So when you read the next part, picture a regular college guy. One who perhaps dabbled in hashish and opium, but a regular guy nonetheless.

Our apartment had two stories. Walking through the front door, you'd be in the living room. The kitchen was at the back of the unit, also on the first floor. Just off of the living room was a long straight set of stairs leading to the second floor where the two bedrooms were located. If you were to head straight at the top of the stairs, you'd be in Elvis' room. That's where he decided to create his very own harem.

Elvis tacked plain white bedsheets to all 4 walls and the entire ceiling in his room. The sheets were attached in such a way that they draped down, billowing into the open room.The furniture in there was sparse, just a bed in the center of the room with nearly everything else hidden away. I think he imagined that women who visited would feel comfortable and undistracted in his love nest, able to focus entirely on sex and sleep.

Then like kudzu, the white sheets began to spread. Elvis hung them in the hallway outside his room and along the wall and ceiling down the stairs. And at the bottom of the stairs on a large blank wall, He hung a huge 6' X 9' pink and red tapestry. The fabric had a sort of Asian design with a large oval shape in the middle.

He said it was supposed to emulate the birth canal. On the way down the stairs, which were draped from ceiling to floor in white sheets, you'd reach the vaginal-looking tapestry leading to the living room. I guess that made his bedroom the uterus. Somehow, girls were impressed. I really can't explain it.