It has been a while since I've posted, mostly due to me working my ass off at 2 jobs which will become three come August 1st. For instance, Friday I worked from 9-4 at the herbal remedies shop and then from 4:30-10 at Circuit City. I was so beat I had to pass on going out at midnight to help the GF celebrate her 21st. Then I worked 9-2 at CC on Saturday, hung out the the GF and friends that day, went out that night and worked noon to 8 on Sunday. To make a long story longer, I'm working almost all the time. And the little bit of down time I have is spent either sleeping or working on my feature story for my Magazine class. So in lieu of a nice long post about WotLK or other such juicy topics, I will be posting an article I wrote last term about life in the dorms. Enjoy!
LESSONS LEARNED
Day one
It was hot outside and Chris Lenci lived on the third floor. This could only increase the difficulty of moving his entire life, or at least what he could stuff into the back of his parents van, into his dorm room.
He had spoken briefly with Daniel Ross on the phone before moving, but to be honest, Chris was nervous. Who was this kid anyways? It seemed now more than ever that letting a 10 question survey on his housing application choose his roommate may have been a mistake.
What if they didn’t like each other? What if Ross liked to throw parties at three in the morning? What if he would be coming home late with girls? Or worse, what if he got up early to study?
There are a lot of things to be nervous about when you move to college, new classes, new teachers, new town, new friends, new responsibilities, new…life. But of all the things to be nervous about, meeting your new roommate can be the scariest.
When Chris climbed the stairs and finally stepped into his room, a 15’ by 10’ cement box in which he would spend the next 9 months of his life, he found that Dan had already moved in.
It wouldn’t be till later that night, after fully unpacking and organizing his half of the room, that Lenci would meet Ross. Ross almost had to duck under the door as he entered. “Wow, you’re really tall” was all that Chris could get out at first.
It took a few minutes of awkward silence and intermittent small talk for them to actually have a conversation. But actually discussing the serious matter of sharing a room together was too awkward at first. “We mostly talked about where we were from, high school sports we played and stuff like that,” says Ross.
To help freshman talk about living together, and set guidelines for each other, every pair of roommates receives a “roommate agreement” from their Resident Assistant.
This small pamphlet asks the questions that most residents might overlook. It is broken up into several useful categories.
Sleep
College students are notorious for a lot of things, not the least of which is a developed ability to get by on minimal sleep.
“It just doesn’t place very high on my priorities,” says Cassidy Slaughter-Mason, Ross’s girlfriend. “There is always something to do and a lot of it is more appealing than sleep.”
Slaughter-Mason calls herself a night person, often staying out late. “I usually plan on going to sleep, but I’ll end up out at the smoking benches hanging out with whoever is there.”
While she is able to get by on her late night schedule, her habits have caused tension between her and roommate Eliza Bryant. “I don’t care if she’s up late, she’s the one who has to deal with being tired, but she woke me up a lot the first term,” says Bryant.
Luckily, the two were able to compromise and an arrangement involving ear plugs and a sort of courtesy curfew has reconciled the situation. “I never told her how annoyed I was; I used to just stay angry with her. When I finally brought it up, she had no idea it bothered me,” said Bryant.
Guests
The term “sexile” is used most often in the dorms, and so many freshmen have never heard of it before moving in. But for some, the learning of this terms true meaning can be an awkward and embarrassing experience.
The term is a combination of the words sex and exile and refers to someone being “exiled” from their room because their roommate is having sex.
Lenci said that he “had never heard of it, but it’s pretty funny actually.” But it wasn’t so funny when he first learned the meaning.
After going to a late movie with some friends, Lenci game back to his room. “When I came back the door was locked, but I knew Dan was in there so I started banging on the door. Then I hear all this shuffling going on and finally he opens the door but he’s in his boxers. He asked me to come back in 20 minutes. It took me a while to figure out what that really meant.”
After that encounter, Lenci and Ross agreed to use a rubber band hanging from the door knob to let each other know the room was “occupied.”
“It was annoying at first because he was always in here with Cassidy, but then I got together with my girlfriend and shut him out a couple times. I think he saw what it was like because he started going to her room more,” said Lenci.
Living Arrangements
Many students feel they can play it safe by rooming with a friend. Rather than getting to know someone new they hope to stick with what they know.
Sandy Schoonover, Director of Residence Life at the
However, she says that “the biggest mistake roommates make is to move in with their best friend.” Drawing on her years of dealing with roommate conflicts, Schoonover says that the most emotional and heated fights are between roommates who were friends before college.
“There’s a difference between knowing someone and living with them,” she says.
In the case of Ricci Cande, a photography major living in the
But on this day, like so many others, Cande sits alone in her room. It’s not so much that Ricci and Hackney don’t get along as that Hackney and college just don’t mix well.
With strong ties to her family in
Now, in spring term, Hackney leaves for
So Ricci has had to look elsewhere for the kind of companionship she hoped to have with Kelly. As a result, she became very close with her floor mates and these are the relationships she plans to hold onto next year.
Looking back
It was strange at first, living with a stranger. After having his own room growing up, a room twice the size of the one he now shares with Ross, it was something to get used to.
Now at the end of his freshman year, that room at home “just seems too big, and it’s mostly empty now,” Chris says. The residence halls have become his home and he compares it to living with friends.
While Lenci and Ross didn’t become close friends over the year, mutual respect and open communication has made them good roommates.
Communication has kept their relationship strong, and now as the year ends they find they are sad to go. “I hope we get to hang out and catch up, he’s a good guy,” says Ross, and Lenci feels the same.
Although Lenci will be a Resident Assistant next year and Ross will be living off campus, the two plan to stay in touch with each other as well as the rest of their hall.
