Front Porch

Is a porch missing from your life? Would living with people that you respect, admire and enjoy in a gracious home where daily chores are willingly shared be an improvement? If you are considering house sharing to reduce your living expenses, it’s critical to get the people, the place and the basic agreements right to ensure a harmonious environment.

House sharing is already underway and, as it becomes more common, it will be heaven for some and hell on earth for others. In the Chicago area, the Interfaith Housing Center of the Northern Suburbs provides the valuable service of matching people with spare capacity in their homes with people who want to live with others for a variety of reasons, including social and economic. The experienced person who arranges the matches is one of the reasons that this program has been successful for many years. For others, living as a renter in someone’s house may not be appealing. Although the Interfaith Housing Center does a great job,  that solution won’t work for everyone.

I think of unmarried, good hearted, but socially awkward men, and even women, and how much richer they would be as human beings if they regularly changed diapers. Or, if they were the healthy one in a house full of flu. I’m not saying this is easy by any stretch of the imagination. I am saying that an important part of life is engaging intimately with others, and that by missing that experience, our lives are diminished. It is axiomatic that we grow through our difficult, challenging experiences, not through comfort or ease. Just as bones and muscle become healthy when we exercise, we become healthy when we are used too.

Living in an inter-generational household could be a God-send. House Sharing: Promise or Peril? describes the elements that must be met for successful house sharing. First and foremost, of course, is the safety of all members. People need to get to know others gradually over time, and still must exercise caution.

If we play our cards differently and learn to support each other, we may be able to sit on the porch after dinner because it’s someone else’s turn to clean up.