On Roommates

I am a college student. I cannot afford my own apartment. Even if I could, there are few/none to be found within the required 1-mile radius from campus, so I join the ranks of starving college students throughout the world and share my house with other starving college students.

Some people are lucky (or wise) enough to rent rooms with people they know. Sure, you always run the risk of losing friends because sometimes even the best friends make the most lousy roommates, but I'd argue that the odds for success are better between familiar roommates. I've been burned a few times in past, so I made the decision this year to find a place where I could have my very own, private little corner.

*Benefits to having my very own, private little corner:
--100% control over the clutter factor. Any and all clutter is my own problem.
--I may have a repeated love affair with the Snooze Button, with no concern I'm waking someone up or annoying them.
--Closet. Space.
--Earphones are an accessory not a necessity, especially after 11pm.
--Undisturbed escape from unwanted/uninvited/loud guests.
--I could sleep naked. I don't, but the option is mine.

*Similar bnefits also apply to having my very own, private pantry for non-perishable food, though I can't say I'd want to sleep naked in my pantry.

As far as I can see, really the only drawback to having a private room is padding my rent check with a few more bucks than the girls who share a room but honestly, that $35 is priceless. At least in theory.

For the most part, having a private room has been all it's chalked up to be. It's very nice to be able to come in at night as late as I want without having to be respectful and quiet for the person fast asleep four feet to my right. But really, for all the benefits of a private room, sharing a bedroom isn't all that bad.

In my experience, what I have found most difficult in sharing an apartment with 2-4 other girls is not so much the bedroom area, but the public area. Sharing a space between two people may be aggravating and perhaps a bit compromising, but when you start sharing things between 5 people, that's when things start to get messy... And I do mean that as literally as I do figuratively.

One would think that five girls between the ages of 20 and 23 would be grownup enough to be able to divide the limited space of a refrigerator, for example. There are many factors to take into account-- potential leftover containers, how many individual gallons of milk might need to be stored, how large an item should be in relation to how quickly it's going to get eaten, etc. At the moment, this is what I have stored in our fridge/freezer:
--1 tub margarine
--1 bottle Ken's Lite Caesar salad dressing
--1 container leftover Massaman curry from Bangkok Thai
--1 jar tomato sauce
--1 jar salsa
--6 frozen dinners
--1 lb frozen ground beef
--3 bags frozen vegetables
--3 popcicles
--1 container cottage cheese
--1 package sliced cheese
--1 package Deli-sliced turkey
--(Until this morning when I finished it) 1 gallon milk

Correct me if I'm wrong, but this is not a great deal of food that needs to be refrigerated. In my opinion, even if you multiplied this by 5 girls, it would not be enough to actually fill the fridge, much less to the capacity to which mine is currently filled. I have been known to check myself when grocery shopping, preferring to buy groceries that do not need to be refrigerated so I don't have fight to fit my things inside, not to mention label it in an obvious enough way so that my milk is not suddenly gone after four uses. Though I'll be honest, labeling is not even a guarantee for anything.

The disaster that is the rest of the kitchen, due to the dishwasher and various cleaning products being ignored, is too large a topic to attempt to tackle just now.

Juggling the living room can be a feat. Here we only have one television. While much of the time housemates may be indifferent to what's playing, it's usually a first-come-first-served arrangement. Tension may run high, however, in the following situations:
--Pleasant quietness interrupted by loud roommates arriving home
--A long string of questions beginning with "What's this?" when a roommate walks into a film or TV show in progress
--DVDs are lent out at will, regardless of who they actually belong to
--Taking extended naps (as opposed to accidental naps) on the couch in the middle of the day
--Dishes, trash, schoolbooks, clothing, blankets, etc. left strewn throughout the room until someone else picks it up

Another potential problem is the shared bathroom. Ah, the shared bathroom. The only thing better than having my very own, private little corner would be to also have my very own, private little bathroom (recognizing that my very own, private little apartment is not an option).

There are a number of tricks in sharing a bathroom including scheduling showers, using the mirror, and purchasing toilet paper. You must be sure to wash all extraneous hair that may have pulled from your head from the shower walls. You must keep the number of Bath and Body Works shower gels to an appropriate amount, since you have to share the corners of the bath with other people and they have shampoo too. Globs of toothpaste left behind in the sink may be acceptable to you, but it is never acceptable in a shared bathroom situation. Prescriptions of any kind may not be shared, even if they look harmless, like a face wash. The prescription was written for someone specifically, and you don't know how much that face wash costs, please and thank you!

Moreover, it must also be explicitly assumed that it is unacceptable to use toiletry items, such as hairspray, makeup, or tissues, that are located within the sacred walls of the very own, private little corner belonging to someone else, particularly if the door is SHUT. For that matter, do not enter any room where the door is shut unless it's your own. For that matter, do not enter any room that does not house any of your personal belongings unless given permission.

And, as if it needs to be reiterated, do not, under any circumstances, open the closed door to a room for which you are not paying rent and have the audacity to help yourself to ANYTHING. Typically, a person is paying extra money for a private room so it remains exactly that: private.


So I guess as much as I enjoy the benefits of my very own, private little corner, they cannot possibly ever outweigh the benefits of living blissfully, comfortably alone. Grass is always greener, isn't it?

Once, I got new glasses

And I love them. Behold.

The reactions I've had to these new glasses of mine have been varied. Generally positive, but then of course there are those people who can't decide how they feel about them-- they're not entirely hateful, but they're not some people's taste, so they stare at them a while, considering them until they realize I've noticed they're staring. That's when they say, "I like your glasses" because they can't come up with any other polite way of telling you they don't actually like them.

True, they're men's glasses. True, they're quasi-tortise shell frames and true, they air on the side of Coke bottle glasses in that they magnify my eyeballs a little bit. But hello? Do you see many other people prancing around with glasses like mine on their faces?

Cue resounding: No!

Luckily most people laugh and say something like, "Only you can pull those off." I'm pretty sure it's a compliment, though vague. I'm not above padding my ego every now and then with stolen compliments.

But what exactly does that mean-- "Only you can pull those off." I mean, I know I have a sparkling personality and everything, and I love clothes. I'm a fashionista as long as a trend amuses me. Well, actually I'm not so much a fashionista as much as I just wear trends that amuse me.

Take, for example, the shoes I'm wearing now. They're little flat slip-on sneakers with staves of music printed all over them. I haven't sat down at the piano just yet to play my shoes and figure out what sonata is written on them, but I'm pretty sure it's Bach. I feel safe saying most musically-inclined clothes credit Bach. Anyway, I've never seen another person wearing these shoes and I think there are few people I can even picture wearing them. My sister, of course, which is why she was delighted when she saw them.

So between my music shoes, my man glasses, and many other choice items from my wardrobe, I've got myself set up to be pretty unique. But it baffles me. This term unique doesn't really have a very solid definition to me, mostly because I look around campus and see hords of students who evidently use their wardrobes for self expression. Gag. Maybe it's the traditionalist coming out in me, but I have little patience for this self expression business. It falls into the same category as feminism and songs like Take Me or Leave Me. What if I don't want to take OR leave you? What if I'm indifferent and would rather just let you be? Then all your whining was for naught, wasn't it?

Anyway, I think it goes without saying that people who are actively using their clothes as a form of self expression are trying to make some kind of statement. Usually I'm not really sure what their statement is supposed to be stating, so mostly I ignore it except to think to myself, That is the ugliest pair of furry boots I've ever seen in my life. If that's what they intended me to think, then I guess they were right on. But if we've got all of these people trying to make statements (consciously or unconsciously), then how many of those statements are actually being made? Have we just become unique for the sake of being unique? And frankly, I'm pretty sure it actually trendy in itself to be unique. If our collective goal is to revel in our own uniqueness, exactly how unique are we?

There's a paradox for you.

This is why I don't pretend to wear clothes that do anything more than tickle my fancy, aside from the basic societal and environmental need to not be naked. I don't listen to indie music because I need to be individualistic, I don't watch and claim to love ca-razy artsy-fartsy movies that will never win an Oscar because it's unconventional. I like things that amuse me. I'll like things until they cease to amuse me. This is the sole reason why I chose this specific pair of glasses.

I guess that could be interpreted as shallow or fickle. If I'm merely amused by things, exactly how deep is my investment here? But in a world where goucho pants are EVERYWHERE one summer and totally out by wintertime, I personally don't see why my "style" should aim to achieve anything beyond amusing me. I don't care if they're not "in." I don't care if I've never seen another person wearing my shoes, and I don't care if mittons are popular.

Here's the catch-- I also wouldn't care if everyone else on campus was wearing mittons like a 5-year old (or in this case, me), too. If one day I'm the only one traipsing around with these glasses on my face and then suddenly everyone else is as well, I don't care. To paraphrase one classy guest on the Montel Williams show, "I wear what I want!"

But to be clear, my glasses are not, in fact, making a personal statement. I do not wear them for any particular obnoxious form of self expression. I saw them, and they amused me, and if you don't like them well, you can take me or leave me.

Our Prophet Dear

The prophet Moroni declared, “In the gift of his Son hath God prepared a more excellent way." You have the witness of that faith. You have the testimony of that faith. You have the example of that faith. Let us all try to stand a little taller, rise a little higher, be a little better. Make the extra effort. You will be happier. You will know a new satisfaction, a new gladness in your heart.

Gordon B. Hinckley
23 June 1910 -- 27 January 2008


Now, as we separate for a season, God bless you, my beloved associates. I so pray, as I say good-bye, in the name of Jesus Christ, amen.

Future Genius

Topics I Will Write About Someday Shortly
Ridiculousness of "celebrity" status
Friendship
Best-Friendship
Ghosts
Personal Catch Phrases
Boys in my German Class
Self-Esteem Boosters, like cute underwear
Humor, and people who aren't actually funny
Buying water
Nicknames
Appropriate and Inappropriate Flirting
Journaling and Hard-Copy Photographs
Asian Food
Picture Frames and Cork Boards
The First Time I Forgot to Do My Homework
Nail Polish
Pretty Smells
Grudges (not the movie)
Everything I Need to Know I Learned from Will & Grace


Expect masterpieces, guys.

Just have to wonder

I'd like to conduct an experiment. I would print off an obscure piece of Ray Bradury or some other equally brilliant writer only I wouldn't include the writer's name, then I would give it to my creative writing class to critique.

Do you think they would tear it apart quite so specifically as they did my writing today?

It won't be long

It's frustrating when you really want to hate a person, but you can't hate them. So instead, you hate the fact that you can't hate them.

My heart hurts a little bit. And I don't mean heartburn!