Roommates...oy
I am a 26 year-0ld with roommates. I find this to strange because I formerly imagined that I would have roommates only during college, thereafter living by myself and then with my partner. And yet here I am, living in a house with three other people and dealing yet again with roommate issues. I'm about done.
My first roommate was back at UW. Oh dorm living...I don't even begin to miss you! My roommate was lovely, actually, a second-gen Vietnamese girl named Thu. She shared her bar fridge, TV, and visitor blow-up mattress with me. She also shared the homemade food her parents sent back with her after weekend visits. So yum. She was this lovely girl that now, even more than then, I appreciate having lived with. She was always tidy, quiet in the mornings, and courteous. I had no idea how I lucked out.
My second roommate was in Vienna, and I lived with a local Austrian university student named Julia. She was also lovely, spoke fluent English (and thus I didn't have to embarass myself by speaking bad German, a mistake that turned positive and led me to South America), shared a love of giant Milka chocolate bars, and let me watch illegally downloaded movies on her computer. She frequently came in late at night, but was very quiet (or was that the earplugs and discman taking effect?). Anyhew, again, awesome roommate.
My third and fourth roommates were two of my best friends, Bethany and Laura, back at UW. This seemed like a great combination to me, I got to live with two of my best friends--it was like a dream come true! Until it fell apart, that is. Living with close friends is not always the way to go. Laura was hardly at home and felt alienated when she came home. Something I didn't understand at the time, but karma came around and kicked my arse with it later.
After a few months of tense co-habitation, Laura and I had a falling out. She moved out and in moved crazy roommate Tanya. The girl had no idea how to take care of herself. The only two things she knew how to make were microwave popcorn and frozen french fries, though she was gifted at destroying both of those. Bethany and I frequently came across old microwaved bags of popcorn that had never been taken out. We also witnessed burnt french fries that were taken out of the oven, set onto the stove and then not tended to until Bethany got annoyed enough to throw them away. (I wouldn't do it--it was the principle of the thing, I wouldn't clean up after her!) This girl spoke on the phone to her boyfriend at all hours, and not in a quiet voice. She was negligent, lazy, unclean, and left nasty messages for us on the bathroom mirror. One day, she left a candle burning in her room while she went off gallivanting with her boyfriend. As you can imagine, a small fire started in her room and set off the smoke alarm. Luckily I was sent home from work early that day and was there when the alarm went off. After a bit of a freak out, I put out the fire (with Tanya's towel, which it probably took me a full 30 seconds to find, but I wasn't going to ruin one of mine or Bethany's to put out that stupid girl's fire!), opened the doors, and sat in front of the alarm waving a towel violently to the smoke from setting it off again. (I didn't have the brain to realize that I should turn it off, and there was some residue of dorm-living that made me think the fire department would come if the alarm kept going off, and then I'd somehow have to pay for the false alarm and I was a college student who could not afford this mess!) With ashes on my face and clothes and black rims around my nostrils, I called crazy roommate's boyfriend and swore up a storm. I knew she was there and he was lying to me. When she finally did call back, it was to say that she had a church class that day and wouldn't be home to clean up the mess, and also to ask whether her doll was damaged in the fire. Let me tell you, I certainly don't give a damn about some idiotic doll! Needless to say, when she got home Bethany and I told her she needed to move out within two weeks. If she didn't, we'd put all of her things out on the deck and get a locksmith to change the locks.
It wasn't the most decent response, but we were working, stressed college girls who didn't have the time or the patience to babysit this loony. Bethany and I were happy to fork out extra rent for a month for the added peace and quiet.
And then my lovely friend Jill became roommate number five. Again, I was in a situation where I was living with two of my best friends. Life was good! Well, it was for a while, anyway, and then it became apparent that three is a really awkward number for roommates. This time, I was the odd one out as I was the person that was always gone. When I'd come home there were inside jokes I didn't get, continued conversation that I wasn't a part of, and I felt alienated. Living became strained, finances were of of the essence and yet another relationship went to the shambles. This convinced me that living by myself was the best possible idea and thus I lived by myself for the next four years.
The first year was sometimes difficult, with feelings of isolation coming and going, but I was pretty happy with the arrangement. When I left for South America, I knew that having a room to myself again would be a luxury to be appreciated. A luxury I only had in Lima, incidentally, but still, it was appreciated! Besides, I knew the nomadic life wouldn't be the same as regular every day life so I was okay with it.
Fast forward a year and I moved to Australia. Three roommates (and one literally in my room with me!). :) Living with Aidan and Bec was just fine. There were some loud parties and there was too much socialization for me, but since most of it took place in our house I was always able to leave whenever I wanted. Not such an issue. We're all less than clean individuals and the bathroom got cleaned only on special occasions and piles of dirty dishes were regularly to be found in the kitchen. But it didn't really matter, because we all had fairly similar thresholds of disgust. During the course of the day, Bec was rarely seen and regularly came home from work after 11 pm. Marcus, Aidan and I went exercised together, cooked together and and watched MacGuyver together. These were positive times and I didn't mind having roommates so much. Oh Aidan, what a happy, lovely, and oh-so-genuine soul. When he left, "The Shop" as we knew it started going down hill.
Roommates? No more!
My first roommate was back at UW. Oh dorm living...I don't even begin to miss you! My roommate was lovely, actually, a second-gen Vietnamese girl named Thu. She shared her bar fridge, TV, and visitor blow-up mattress with me. She also shared the homemade food her parents sent back with her after weekend visits. So yum. She was this lovely girl that now, even more than then, I appreciate having lived with. She was always tidy, quiet in the mornings, and courteous. I had no idea how I lucked out.
My second roommate was in Vienna, and I lived with a local Austrian university student named Julia. She was also lovely, spoke fluent English (and thus I didn't have to embarass myself by speaking bad German, a mistake that turned positive and led me to South America), shared a love of giant Milka chocolate bars, and let me watch illegally downloaded movies on her computer. She frequently came in late at night, but was very quiet (or was that the earplugs and discman taking effect?). Anyhew, again, awesome roommate.
My third and fourth roommates were two of my best friends, Bethany and Laura, back at UW. This seemed like a great combination to me, I got to live with two of my best friends--it was like a dream come true! Until it fell apart, that is. Living with close friends is not always the way to go. Laura was hardly at home and felt alienated when she came home. Something I didn't understand at the time, but karma came around and kicked my arse with it later.
After a few months of tense co-habitation, Laura and I had a falling out. She moved out and in moved crazy roommate Tanya. The girl had no idea how to take care of herself. The only two things she knew how to make were microwave popcorn and frozen french fries, though she was gifted at destroying both of those. Bethany and I frequently came across old microwaved bags of popcorn that had never been taken out. We also witnessed burnt french fries that were taken out of the oven, set onto the stove and then not tended to until Bethany got annoyed enough to throw them away. (I wouldn't do it--it was the principle of the thing, I wouldn't clean up after her!) This girl spoke on the phone to her boyfriend at all hours, and not in a quiet voice. She was negligent, lazy, unclean, and left nasty messages for us on the bathroom mirror. One day, she left a candle burning in her room while she went off gallivanting with her boyfriend. As you can imagine, a small fire started in her room and set off the smoke alarm. Luckily I was sent home from work early that day and was there when the alarm went off. After a bit of a freak out, I put out the fire (with Tanya's towel, which it probably took me a full 30 seconds to find, but I wasn't going to ruin one of mine or Bethany's to put out that stupid girl's fire!), opened the doors, and sat in front of the alarm waving a towel violently to the smoke from setting it off again. (I didn't have the brain to realize that I should turn it off, and there was some residue of dorm-living that made me think the fire department would come if the alarm kept going off, and then I'd somehow have to pay for the false alarm and I was a college student who could not afford this mess!) With ashes on my face and clothes and black rims around my nostrils, I called crazy roommate's boyfriend and swore up a storm. I knew she was there and he was lying to me. When she finally did call back, it was to say that she had a church class that day and wouldn't be home to clean up the mess, and also to ask whether her doll was damaged in the fire. Let me tell you, I certainly don't give a damn about some idiotic doll! Needless to say, when she got home Bethany and I told her she needed to move out within two weeks. If she didn't, we'd put all of her things out on the deck and get a locksmith to change the locks.
It wasn't the most decent response, but we were working, stressed college girls who didn't have the time or the patience to babysit this loony. Bethany and I were happy to fork out extra rent for a month for the added peace and quiet.
And then my lovely friend Jill became roommate number five. Again, I was in a situation where I was living with two of my best friends. Life was good! Well, it was for a while, anyway, and then it became apparent that three is a really awkward number for roommates. This time, I was the odd one out as I was the person that was always gone. When I'd come home there were inside jokes I didn't get, continued conversation that I wasn't a part of, and I felt alienated. Living became strained, finances were of of the essence and yet another relationship went to the shambles. This convinced me that living by myself was the best possible idea and thus I lived by myself for the next four years.
The first year was sometimes difficult, with feelings of isolation coming and going, but I was pretty happy with the arrangement. When I left for South America, I knew that having a room to myself again would be a luxury to be appreciated. A luxury I only had in Lima, incidentally, but still, it was appreciated! Besides, I knew the nomadic life wouldn't be the same as regular every day life so I was okay with it.
Fast forward a year and I moved to Australia. Three roommates (and one literally in my room with me!). :) Living with Aidan and Bec was just fine. There were some loud parties and there was too much socialization for me, but since most of it took place in our house I was always able to leave whenever I wanted. Not such an issue. We're all less than clean individuals and the bathroom got cleaned only on special occasions and piles of dirty dishes were regularly to be found in the kitchen. But it didn't really matter, because we all had fairly similar thresholds of disgust. During the course of the day, Bec was rarely seen and regularly came home from work after 11 pm. Marcus, Aidan and I went exercised together, cooked together and and watched MacGuyver together. These were positive times and I didn't mind having roommates so much. Oh Aidan, what a happy, lovely, and oh-so-genuine soul. When he left, "The Shop" as we knew it started going down hill.
Roommates? No more!
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