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When my gf and I moved in together most of my furniture and belongings didn't make the cut and I was ok with that. She left me room for my guitars and hobby table. However, I also came with a large collection of books. My old storage system for these books was 2 laundry baskets. She immediately vetoed this and demanded that I put my books into extra drawers located throughout the house. This got annoying really quickly and so we decided to go to a garage sale and buy some book shelves. This one sale was selling two huge, like 6'5'' book shelves for 10 bucks a piece. We agreed to buy one because It was big enough to hold all my books. When I came home from work the next day the book shelf was full of knick knacks. All but two shelves were filled with a variety of pictures, paperweights, and a whole collection of useless crap that I'm pretty sure exists solely to take up space. Even the two shelves she allotted for books had knick knacks that were meant to go in front of the books. Among this assortment was a rock. Not a shiny, polished, neat colored rock. I'm talking about a greyish white, shot put sized, otherwise unremarkable piece of metamorphic rock that was dug up from some construction going on a few apartments over. After I crammed as many of my books into those two shelves as I could, Books still had to be set up to the side of the bookshelf on the floor; not to mention that the books were in there so tight I had to use a crowbar to get any out. I'm convinced now that the reason she didn't let me buy the second bookshelf is because she didn't have enough junk to take the place of the books I would buy the thing for.

Has anyone else had trouble with significant others and the use of shelf space?

Thats nothing. Just wait until you're married.

I gave up and just bought another, smaller book shelf for myself. The war against knick knacks cannot be won.

She´s just marking her territory you´ll have to put up with it no matter how many booksleves you buy.

BTW I pick option 4, mine allowed me to buy a nice cabinet for my minis and even gave me part of the dining room to my stuff. Now you can swear that´ll you´ll kill me for rubbing it.

M.

Sounds like it's time for a fight. It doesn't have to be an ugly bloody fight, but if you don't stand up for yourself and your needs now, its only going to get harder as time goes on. You obviously care about having enough space for your things (in this case books) and you may very well be entitled to it. So first thing is to look at how much space you are really taking up compared to her. Not just book shelf space, but other space as well. You may have 2 shelves and she has 6, but you have a hobby table too. Does she have something comparable? Go around your place and really look at things and see who really owns what bits of space there are. Maybe you are already taking up your fare share and maybe you are not. If you are not, then sit down with the girl and have a talk. Do it from a "My needs are not being met" stand point and try to come into it with a couple of possible solutions (like getting another book shelf for you or putting up some wall shelves for her stuff, or maybe hanging her pictures on the wall rather than sitting them on the book shelf). It is possible that she filled the shelves because she underestimated the amount of space you needed. She might also be under the impression that displaying your books isn't important to you (they're just books) so she puts stuff in front of them to make things pretty / homey. That or maybe she is just some insidious being out to drain your soul and slowly take over every bit of space till you are confined to a small corner and all your stuff is out on the curb. Who knows? In either case, if you feel you are entitled to some more space, make sure she knows it and understands what you want. If she is reasonable (and you are too) then she’ll probably let you get the space you want (either in the form of extra shelves or perhaps in another book case that’s yours). However if you just let this go, then you won’t get what you want.

In the case of the rock, ask her about it. While it obviously wasn’t chosen for its beauty, there might be a story behind it. I knew a guy who had a very unremarkable piece of broken red brick displayed in his house (on the mantle over his fire place, front and center). It looked really out of place. So I asked him about it at one point. He told me that it was a piece of Yankee Stadium that he got when they rebuilt it at one point. He was a huge baseball fan and used to go to games there when he was a kid. So, the unremarkable chunk of rock was actually important.

I'm not sure to what extent you've talked to her about this. A lot of problems exists when people don't communicate (it sounds obvious but people always forget). If she likes displaying her stuff, then maybe suggest getting a curio chest or some smaller wall mounted shelves for it.

As phoenix said, you need to discuss this. It could be thoughtlessness on her part, it could be selfishness on her part, or it could be that she doesn't understand why you wouldn't want her knickknacks all over the place. It's very hard to tell when one party or the other is giving up too much, and women tend to look at the whole situation while men look at the specific.

Look at other aspects of the relationship: do you agree on movies, or defer to one person judgment? How do you spend weekends? Holidays? If one person is calling most of the shots, that's not always healthy. Of course, she could be reacting against what she sees as her life being subsumed by yours.

In short, talk about it, keep in mind that it's one tiny event in a relationship, and keep the broader context of your relationship in mind.

Thanks for the advice. We're moving into a new place on Monday and I think during the set up I'll do an assessment of the space situation like you suggest phoenix. To be fair I've never really asked her about the rock and we've never had a serious conversation about the shelves more than me chiding her about all the knick knacks and her retorting about all the books. Either way, we need more shelves. I think wall shelves might be the way to go.

Miguelsan, you are a luck guy.

lifeafter wrote:When my gf and I moved in together most of my furniture and belongings didn't make the cut and I was ok with that.

Hahaha, you're whipped!


FWIW, I have 3 sets of wire shelving in my room, along with additional wire shelving for my AV gear. And industrial storage racks in the garage. My space is manly. My wife hates it: "it looks like a warehouse".

Also, I don't display armies - I keep my gaming stuff in storage transport cases, or boxed. It's much more convenient for me this way.

Getting back to bookshelves, my wife and I actually use our bookshelves for books. We have *lots* of books. Although she does like to put miscellaneous small whatnots on the open space. Like tiny stuffed animals and such. As they're in front of her books, I don't care. She as a tiny glass cabinet that she puts her souvenirs in.

When my wife's father passed, one of many mementoes we recieved was a bookcase that he had made with glass doors, pretty nice. Her suggesstion was that I display my armies in it. She keeps on me to put more shelves into it.

It's hard to put the crack pipe down when your spouse keeps it hot for you.

grizgrin wrote:It's hard to put the crack pipe down when your spouse keeps it hot for you.

You've got it made. Mine is always telling me to stop smoking crack, trying to send me to rehab and threatening to call the cops. She'll never do it...

TOSS THE KNICK-KNACKS!

Go and get some eyes from a craft store, stick them and a bowtie on the rock and refer to it in the third person.

Rock will be gone in a couple of days, or you could just throw it out....

Maybe you could paint it too. Depending on how dumb she thinks oyur wargaming habit it, it might make a good land raider.

I moved all of my wifes crap out of the extra room, and made a 'man' room.

She's not allowed to move, touch, or do anything in there.

Does mean I have to clean it, but then my mancard isn't punched like everyone else I knows is.

I have a man cave as well. It's called my house. She got me to buy the thing sight unseen, so I got to gut it and make it mine.

This is why i love my wife, i hate for you guys and all the uselss junk i mean knick knacks. My wife collects one group of things and one group only and thats shot glasses which are all located in the living room in a nice orderly fashion hanging from shelves. She went out and bought a old china cabinet refurnished it for me and made it into my army storage area, also gave me the front closest as well. We both have our own book shelves and then there is the shrunk which is full of my star wars collectiables. When i say i got it made im not kiding. She'd rather go buy tackle and bait for fishing then buy useless junk. If she cant use it she doesnt want it. However when we do buy our home sometime in the near future she has demanded that all my stuff must be moved to the man room and that sits fine with me. On the downside she is very outspoken which has gotten us in trouble while out in public more then once.

Since i bought the house in my name, the whole bookshelf and everything else in it is mine, except her stuff. but shes into to it too!!!! yay!!!

I too have a room for my stuff.

The wife has the rest of the house but this land is mine!

First:

We agreed to buy one because It was big enough to hold all my books.

And you let it happen?
P#ssy! Punch her in the face, throw her sh## out and put your books up.


Alternatively, you could have a conversation with her about the fact that it was bought for YOUR BOOKS and you don't appreciate her taking it over with her stuff.

Come to think of it, I'd probably take the "Alternate" route, too. LOL

I'm fortunate in that I'm currently building my Man Cave in the basement.

Overall, it takes up almost half of my basement.
There's a gaming room big enough for 2 4x8 MONSTER gaming tables (though I'll only have one, and I'm probably paring it down to 4x6) AND a 'love seat," a floor to ceiling built in shelf unit (3' wide, 2' deep). There's a TV area for a small entertainment center and a sofa. it has a built in shels unit about 4.5' wide and a little deeper than the width of a DVD for stpring DVD's and sports memorabilia (collector baseballs, etc)... Oh... and my WORK ROOM... an 8x10 room with floor and wall cabinets (kitchen cabinet style) and an L shaped counter top that covers 2 walls. that is where I'll do my painting and converting and have MY computer. Drop ceilings all through.
Oh... there's also a "terrain closet" off of the gaming area that's about the equivalent of 25 - 36 Sq. Ft.

Mwahahahahahahahahahaha

Life will be good.

The best thing is that, if we ever move, it'll make a spectacular Master bedroom, with the workroom as a huge walk in closet.

Eric