The Vine

So it's no secret that I love Television Without Pity. One of the recappers has her own site (well, most all of them do, really), and it's fabulous. I came across this little snippet the other day, and I thought that it was fitting. Here's the text as well:

Dear Sars,

I recently moved into an apartment at school with three good friends from the past couple of years. We have all gotten along well in the past, but yet are very different.

One big difference between me and my roommates is that I have a long-time boyfriend. I really like to spend the night with him, but his apartment is very noisy. He stayed here a lot before school started and it has only been a week since school started. He stayed here on Tuesday, Thursday, Friday, and Saturday night.

This weekend my roommates called a meeting. One in particular wants to ban boys staying in the apartment during the week. My boyfriend is very polite, quiet and courteous to them. He cleans up after himself, never showers here, and doesn't disrupt anyone's sleep. My roommate just says that she wants to know it is only girls in the apartment. And she is worried about it being awkward if she runs into him in the hall in the middle of the night when she goes to the bathroom. I do not share a bedroom with any of my roommates, if I did, he wouldn't stay. Am I asking too much for him to be able to stay? Should he be staying less frequently?

I'm stuck. Right now, I feel like I have to choose between my best friends and my boyfriend. What do I do?

Signed,Lonely

Dear Lonely,

The issue isn't that your boyfriend is rude or a dick; it's that he...doesn't live there. He doesn't pay rent. He doesn't have a room. This isn't the arrangement your roommates agreed to; they thought they'd live with you, not with you and him.

That might seem like splitting hairs to you, but think of it from their side -- four out of five nights last week, they had a houseguest whom they didn't invite, and again, I'm sure your boyfriend doesn't clog the drain or make noise, but he's still in their space, and his loud apartment isn't their problem, really.

The "during the week" part seems kind of arbitrary, but if they want to limit "people who don't receive mail at that address" guests to, say, two or three nights a week, I think that's fair of them. If you and your boyfriend want to spend more time together than that, you can invest in some earplugs.