My college roommate found our first adult apartment, an unbelievable duplex, in Center City. It was perfect in many ways—dishwasher, washer/dryer in the bathroom, elegant spiral staircase, directly above an independent bookstore.

Chung’s Dorm, Groton, Mass., (Room and board)
I was the last resident to move into this slim triple at the end of the downstairs hall, so I got the top bunk and the awkward desk. The phone was right outside our room. I tried to avoid it, as there was not much good news to report.

Liz Rush has lived in some places. Some of them were abroad!

Two months ago I found, got, and lost my dream apartment over the course of 24 hours.

Adam Simon has lived in some places.

Where have you lived, Nora Cobo?

It seems like all of the places I’ve lived, to a certain degree, have been about a combination of making the space my own and trying not to care about what people think, while I work on carving out a life that I believe in and actually only needs to feel good to me.

I met my roommate Ellen on move-in day. We were a perfect match according to our student info sheets: same extracurricular activities, part-time job, and hobbies.

Tuxedo Park, Calgary, AB – $485/month (1999-2001) A month after graduating high school, I moved out of my parents’ home and bounced around for half a year before I found this apartment on Calgary’s Centre Street. I sublet a room in a house with five other girls, which was awful and lasted a month. I rented a room in a kitchen-less basement with my cousin, which was even more awful and lasted only two months. I had my own basement suite in a house with a snoopy landlady that snuck in and rifled through my closet. But this, my first real apartment, was perfect! It was a simple one-bedroom (bedroom, living room, kitchen, and bath) in a small 12-suite apartment complex I found in the newspaper’s classifieds. It was on a main street that was close to everything I loved: my family, my boyfriend, my job, my friends, everything.

I loved living alone and this was the perfect starter apartment for a 19-year-old. The building manager was awesome and even once drove over to let me back into my suite after I locked myself out when I’d gone downstairs to grab my laundry, leaving me sitting sadly in the hallway wearing my pajamas until he showed up. And the other tenants were either helpful (giving my car jumpstarts when I’d forget to plug it in overnight in winter) or invisible. I still miss this place.

When the cab driver dropped me off at my new home, he warned me about the neighborhood. "Oh, no, love, you don’t want to live here," he said. "It’s not safe."