(no subject)
I haven't talked about it here much at all, but I moved in mid-January after co-signing with my parents for a condo unit in North York. It's not a bad place but it's quiet. Very very quiet. It is my home as well as my office and there are often days where I won't go out at all if I don't need to.
I have always been a quiet person, so perhaps this is well suited to me. I won't say I'm uncomfortable with the place because it affords - at least on the surface - some distance from a lot of the oppressive expectation that comes with living with my parents.
But realistically, the more I look at it these days and how my parents react to very personal decisions about how I wish to live here, the more I feel like being strong-armed in to co-signing for this place was like signing my adult life away to my parents, who want nothing more than to micromanage what I do, how I live, whether I can own a pet, and if so what kind.
A little background - my mother has hated cats ever since one of her tenants back in Calgary turned out to be owning way more cats than she said she did and as a result, had been mistreating them and not properly managing their waste. The situation ended up being very expensive to take care of and I'm sure left a negative impression on her with regard to cats.
With that said, once, when I was very small, we did own a cat, and my parents had no problems keeping it, aside from the fact that at the time, I did not have a good immune response to it. So back then, we got rid of the cat and moved on with our lives.
A few years later, we got a dog. And she was a companion to us all for nigh on 17 years.
Fast forward to the last few months - I've been living alone. I like it. But it's awfully quiet. I had tossed around the idea of getting a pet even before moving out - it'd come to mind particularly since I work alone and often need some afk time (which i don't often take). With the move, it seemed like that might be all the more possible too. There are many pet owners in the building and as long as they are domestic house pets, the condo board doesn't mind. My parents and I have even remarked upon the prevalence of pets in the building, with no apparent negative remarks.
So having pet on the brain, I began researching what would be feasible for me.
I like both cats and dogs and have no prejudices toward either; I *am* allergic to both, though to varying degrees. I have had some very good and some very bad reactions to both, and they have almost always been very breed specific.
Despite having had a dog as a companion for so long growing up, I would have to say the relationship was more sibling and less dominant/submissive, which is essentially what dogs need. In my family, my parents provided that behavior - the dog was affectionate towards me, but clearly knew who wasn't the Master. Towards those ends, I'm not at the stage in my life where I want to spend the massive amounts of time dogs demand to develop those dominance relationships. Perhaps at a different stage in my life? Perhaps if i lived in a house with ready access to the outdoors and was able to provide the active lifestyle a dog requires? But no, right now is not the right time for a dog.
A cat, on the other hand, provides possibilities. Certainly not as critical to establish an alpha structure. Definitely more self-sufficient, suitable for a completely indoor environment, and something I have thought about very very much for quite some time.
I ended up doing research on breeds of cats which are less susceptible to putting off high levels of the allergen protein in their saliva and came up with a few possibilities - Siberian, Balinese, Javanese, Oriental... and Bengal. I want to at least visit a breeder of these pets and see what sort of reaction i might be exposing myself to from these supposedly less allergenic cats. I even went so far as to arrange for a meeting this coming weekend out of town.
Of course i had to open my big mouth about it in idle conversation about it today over the phone, while confirming a new rental price with my mother... and she pretty much blew up.
She claims cats will piss on and scratch anything, she claims they are too expensive to handle every month. She claims I'm not responsible enough to take care of a cat (and yet i am responsible enough to pay the rent on time, feed myself, run my own corporation, pay the bills...?).
She forbids me to keep a pet, though apparently she'd have less issue with a small dog. When I said I was seeking companionship in a pet, my father yelled 'GET A BOYFRIEND' in the background.
...
Touché. But still. Easier said than done. And one needs to feel happy with life as it is before seeking life with another, no?
So I have to say I am pretty upset. Not solely because I've been forbidden to own a pet but because my life can never be on my own terms. I would have been totally OK with renting an apartment on my own, and at the price i'm now paying, it wouldn't be terribly shabby. It also wouldn't have my parents' expectations hanging over me continually and I would be free to feel like, at age 28, i have an independant life and should feel comfortable with myself as an individual as well as in social situations.
But now, three months after having moved out, i totally don't feel that way and am not at all sure what i want to do about it.
If it continues I am quite sure I will break down in some shape or form. Life and possibility is just slowing to a complete stop and the more time passes the more I feel depressed about it and really unable to do anything about it.
I have always been a quiet person, so perhaps this is well suited to me. I won't say I'm uncomfortable with the place because it affords - at least on the surface - some distance from a lot of the oppressive expectation that comes with living with my parents.
But realistically, the more I look at it these days and how my parents react to very personal decisions about how I wish to live here, the more I feel like being strong-armed in to co-signing for this place was like signing my adult life away to my parents, who want nothing more than to micromanage what I do, how I live, whether I can own a pet, and if so what kind.
A little background - my mother has hated cats ever since one of her tenants back in Calgary turned out to be owning way more cats than she said she did and as a result, had been mistreating them and not properly managing their waste. The situation ended up being very expensive to take care of and I'm sure left a negative impression on her with regard to cats.
With that said, once, when I was very small, we did own a cat, and my parents had no problems keeping it, aside from the fact that at the time, I did not have a good immune response to it. So back then, we got rid of the cat and moved on with our lives.
A few years later, we got a dog. And she was a companion to us all for nigh on 17 years.
Fast forward to the last few months - I've been living alone. I like it. But it's awfully quiet. I had tossed around the idea of getting a pet even before moving out - it'd come to mind particularly since I work alone and often need some afk time (which i don't often take). With the move, it seemed like that might be all the more possible too. There are many pet owners in the building and as long as they are domestic house pets, the condo board doesn't mind. My parents and I have even remarked upon the prevalence of pets in the building, with no apparent negative remarks.
So having pet on the brain, I began researching what would be feasible for me.
I like both cats and dogs and have no prejudices toward either; I *am* allergic to both, though to varying degrees. I have had some very good and some very bad reactions to both, and they have almost always been very breed specific.
Despite having had a dog as a companion for so long growing up, I would have to say the relationship was more sibling and less dominant/submissive, which is essentially what dogs need. In my family, my parents provided that behavior - the dog was affectionate towards me, but clearly knew who wasn't the Master. Towards those ends, I'm not at the stage in my life where I want to spend the massive amounts of time dogs demand to develop those dominance relationships. Perhaps at a different stage in my life? Perhaps if i lived in a house with ready access to the outdoors and was able to provide the active lifestyle a dog requires? But no, right now is not the right time for a dog.
A cat, on the other hand, provides possibilities. Certainly not as critical to establish an alpha structure. Definitely more self-sufficient, suitable for a completely indoor environment, and something I have thought about very very much for quite some time.
I ended up doing research on breeds of cats which are less susceptible to putting off high levels of the allergen protein in their saliva and came up with a few possibilities - Siberian, Balinese, Javanese, Oriental... and Bengal. I want to at least visit a breeder of these pets and see what sort of reaction i might be exposing myself to from these supposedly less allergenic cats. I even went so far as to arrange for a meeting this coming weekend out of town.
Of course i had to open my big mouth about it in idle conversation about it today over the phone, while confirming a new rental price with my mother... and she pretty much blew up.
She claims cats will piss on and scratch anything, she claims they are too expensive to handle every month. She claims I'm not responsible enough to take care of a cat (and yet i am responsible enough to pay the rent on time, feed myself, run my own corporation, pay the bills...?).
She forbids me to keep a pet, though apparently she'd have less issue with a small dog. When I said I was seeking companionship in a pet, my father yelled 'GET A BOYFRIEND' in the background.
...
Touché. But still. Easier said than done. And one needs to feel happy with life as it is before seeking life with another, no?
So I have to say I am pretty upset. Not solely because I've been forbidden to own a pet but because my life can never be on my own terms. I would have been totally OK with renting an apartment on my own, and at the price i'm now paying, it wouldn't be terribly shabby. It also wouldn't have my parents' expectations hanging over me continually and I would be free to feel like, at age 28, i have an independant life and should feel comfortable with myself as an individual as well as in social situations.
But now, three months after having moved out, i totally don't feel that way and am not at all sure what i want to do about it.
If it continues I am quite sure I will break down in some shape or form. Life and possibility is just slowing to a complete stop and the more time passes the more I feel depressed about it and really unable to do anything about it.