I am in only my fourth semester of college at the University of Southern Mississippi, and boy, have I had a lot of roommate disasters. I guess growing up as an only child could have something to do with it. I never had to learn to share a bathroom or a sink, let alone a room! However, none of this even crossed my mind as I was heading to college. I was just so darn excited about living in the dorms and experiencing a newfound freedom, I wasn’t quite sure what I was getting into. Here are a few of my experiences with on-campus living and what you can do to learn from my mistakes.
My freshman year, my roommate was a girl I barely knew. Before school started, she randomly asked if I wanted to room with her. She seemed like a pretty cool girl, so we lived together somewhat harmoniously… for a while.
Unfortunately, as time moved on I realized I became more and more aggravated. She was extremely messy. I would find cereal, paper, and other random things all over the floor. She never took the trash out, never cleaned up after herself, and left food everywhere. Our room eventually got infested with fruit flies, and we had to call an exterminator to get rid of them!
I never told her how much her messiness bothered me until one day, when I just let it all out on the poor girl. I yelled at her for about an hour. We still remained friends somehow, and both eventually forgave each other. After that, I decided I would never room with someone I didn’t know. For me, it is harder to communicate my frustration to a stranger than one of my friends.
The next year, my best friend in the whole world asked me to move in with her. She was the best roommate ever, and we got along great. Or at least, I thought we did. However, during Christmas break, she told me she was moving out because there were some things I was doing that had been aggravating her, and she hadn’t told me about it.
I was crushed. Since she told me she was moving out less than two weeks before school started, I really had no option except to accept a randomly selected roommate. I am still living with the girl I was assigned, and she seems like a very laid back, nice girl.
Because of these two roommate disasters, I have learned three extremely important things about being a good roomie.
- You have to learn how to express yourself in nice way as soon as problems arise. You also need to let your roommate know that whenever something is bothering her, she can tell you without being scared that you’ll get angry. The secret to being good roommates is to have a very open, tolerant, and understanding relationship.
- Accept the fact that at some point, your roommate will do something that you don’t like. You just have to deal with this in a mature and calm way.
- You need to lay everything out on the table when you first start rooming with someone. Ask them what bothers them ahead of time, and tell them what bothers you.
No matter what roommate disaster befalls you, don’t ever let rooming with someone ruin a good friendship. Always remember that your roommate is only human, and an equal relationship requires some give and take.
Photo Credit: Floyd Brown