LIVING IN LITTLE

New Zealand Herald, Volume LXXII, Issue 22130, 8 June 1935, Page 6 (Supplement)

LIVING IN LITTLE

EULOGY ON FLATS THEIR INCREASING POPULARITY BY J. B. HASTINGS There is an abstract virtue associated with the word " little " that bears no relation to facts. We no longer say, "That's a nice little hat," oddly enough, because all hats are small and many of them little to the point of absurdity. But we still say, " What a nice little room," though it may be gigantic compared with that of a modern " semi " and a " splendid little wife," though she may tower head and shoulders over her husband and us. Used in that sense it is a term of endearment rather than a statement of fact. Some peculiar inversion of thought seems to trick me into this habit —for habit it is. Things that are little are almost without exception charming, delightful, lovable, it would seem (regardless of mice, cockroaches, peevish children and a few other small objectionables). We have recently removed from what appreciative visitors described as " a lovely little house " with a " beautiful little garden " to what has been described as a " jolly little fiat." The reason we left the house was the large size of it and its " little " garden, for both made loud calls on the household labour account. The reason we came to the flat was to find a small, compact home —to live in little. It is not really surprising that we were somewhat confused by the word " little," but we are confused no longer. We have discovered the joy of living in little, and, rightly or wrongly, we should be inclined to use the word as an expression of the highest possible appreciation if it were not for the fear of being corrected. We were warned by well-meaning friends that there was all the difference in the world between a roomy house built in the immediate pre-war days and a three-roomed flat on the first floor . We were told how we would miss the garden, for a garden that is common ground for five fiats cannot be intimate and personal. It was ruled as firmly as if the ruling were that of the High Court of Appeal that a flat was 110 place for a child; a flat would be like a prison, and the constant need of'respecting the occupants of the other fiats would make impossible tho noisiness which appears to be a child's birthright. in these enlightened days. So many and various were the reasons adduced against our project of living in little that a procession bedecked with black crepe might reasonably have followed our removal van to the new address. We certainly have found a great deal of difference between the roomy house and the three-roomed flat, but we wanted to do so. It is because there is a difference that we like it. We like the pleasurable triumph that comes of managing to store away out of sight all the things that one likes out of sight, like stepladders, vacuum cleaner, brushes and spare jam pots. Our garden has shrunk from half an acre to ten square feet in the window boxes that are to stand in front of the windows, but how intimate and personal window-box gardening can be we are just beginning to discover, as the plan for our garden for the year is mainly theory as yet. As for the flat being a prison for a child, there are no signs of it. If it is a prison, he finds it very interesting, for the other occupants are a source of unflagging delight to him, and he responds to the necessity of considering them in a way that suggests the makings of a sense of responsibility to other people, which, as communities, our civilisation sadly lacks. If living in flats widens our appreciation of the fact that we are part of a community with interests in common, as much as living in a large house in the middle of a fairly large garden can narrow it, then living in little has a virtue that our well-meaning and mourning friends cannot perhaps realise.