roommate issues

Alexander and I mostly get along.  But today he says to me, “If we were married, we’d probably be divorced by now.”

He doesn’t like:

• That I don’t like his coming home at 3:15 am, and only after I text him and tell him he has to come home (like he did last night).
• That I wake him at 11, or later, and am annoyed for his having wasted half the day.
• My “nagging” him about going to the gym…a summer membership he just had to have,  that I am paying for, and that he only reluctantly goes to. 
• That I don’t like the rap songs he likes to play that are filled with misogynist lyrics and vulgar words.
• My reminding him to, “Take the trash downstairs,” or “Empty the dishwasher,” or “Fluff up the pillows on the sofa,” or some other mundane chore.
• My wanting to talk about his life.

In short, I think Alexander wishes he had a studio.  Or at least that he wasn’t sharing his living quarters with his mom.

Today I say to him, “How about this?  Let’s pick one habit we don’t like in the other and see if we can then change that habit.  Okay, you go first.  What one habit would you like me to stop doing?”

 “Talking,” he says.

 I’m  rendered speechless.