the epicenter of cool

never in a million years did i think that my apartment would be the epicenter of cool. who would wanna hang out at my house? it looks like crap. going into this year i really believed that everyone would be hanging out at "skinny house". skinny house is what we call the place where my lovely friends caroline, chelsea, laura, tara, and tiffany live. they are such awesome girls with a whole house, they are all so good at decorating and party planning, they even planted some flowers around their house. then there's what we call "outback house". outback house is the home of dann, evan, keith, nate, and steve-o. this house comes complete with a make-out room, hot tub, a basement with drums, guitar, bass, and sound equipment, and a huge movie screen. outback house is also the home of such famous events as the annual apple fest, best party around. although going into this school year i was excited to be visiting all of my friends awesome housing arrangements, i was sad because i though that no one would ever want to come over my house.

let's face it. my little apartment is not that high class. my roommate jessica and i have a motto that we repeat to ourselves about our apartment. we like to say, "it's ghetto, but it's ours". our apartment can be described as the following: There is one main room, one bedroom, one kitchen, one bathroom. The paint job is crappy, there is a leak in the bathroom, the heat escapes out the window, there's always construction going on in the hallway, the stairs up here are like a death-trap, there's a whole in the kitchen floor, the light doesn't work in the fridge, and there aren't enough parking spots. we have mis-matched furniture, no awesome stereosystems or gamesystems, there's no wall art, and the only plant is a cactus sitting by the sink. all that being said: i love the place.

i'm so thankful for this apartment, it's just what we need and no more. jessica just said to me, "you know what makes me sad? there are people who don't have an apartment right now. they're out in the cold".

not only do i have the job of being a good steward of this place, but i get to share it with people i love. we don't have a lot, but we get to enjoy the little things in life. here we play monopoly, write, knit, play guitar, make baked goods, study, watch both entertaining and educational movies, draw, and read. we talk about politics, daily anecdotes, theology, stewardship, our pet peeves, and what it means to live differently. despite the fact that we have what the rest of the world would call a crappy apartment, we see it as a beautiful place where great things happen everyday. we love when people come over and don't leave for hours. this is a place where we see community in action. where we can share things and ideas. it's a place that God is using to do His work.