This week I want to stress the importance of the relationships that people actually have with one another. There is a lot that can be taken for granted, underappreciated, and even unnoticed when you are with people who treat you well because that’s just how they are. Of course, sometimes you get mad at someone who treats you very well, and on the other hand, good people make mistakes. A very good friend had a good point: “We don’t do stupid stuff for no reason. We do it because we don’t think it will be stupid.”
As I reflect on the things that happened in my room this year, I can say that I have taken certain relationships for granted, and we have done things that were stupid just because we didn’t think they would be in the end. But then again, that’s life, isn’t it? People just have to keep deciding, making decisions all the time. It is like a test to see how many a person can make until there is one bad one that spoils everything before it.
That is like what happened when the roommates had a “blowout” a few weeks ago. It was one bad choice that almost wiped out all of the good ones that preceded it. We took our relationship as roommates for granted, and we took each other’s tolerance for granted when we should have been more careful to respect everyone without cutting corners.
Learning that is one of the most significant outcomes of living in this situation. As three weeks remain until summer, I can say I have learned more than I could have ever imagined. I care about people who were once strangers and no more than Facebook profiles. I know what it is like to share, live with others, adjust to different personalities/backgrounds, deal with people on their bad days, talk about problems without fighting, tolerate things that would have annoyed me at home, and adjust my lifestyle to fit with the circumstances I have.
Coming into a supplemental room was a challenge that I was forced to face, and luckily turned out to be one that I have faced successfully (unless something really bad happens in the next three weeks). Coming to college is much more than adjusting to a new place, meeting new people, and studying for good grades. I have found it to be a way of modifying myself. It’s the first time, for me at least, where I am living apart from my family and friends. It is a series of challenges and tests that I have had to face, and to get through the year, I have had to pass. I know that makes it seem like a totally stressful and horrifying experience, but I’ve tried to go through it all hoping for beginner’s luck and some chances to try again later.
Thursday, April 19, 2012
Thursday, April 12, 2012
Resettling-In
This week served as an adjustment period for most of the roommates as well as myself. Things are basically back to normal, and I mean normal in the way where we just go about our business without carrying loads of extra bitterness or anger with us over anything. Even though it is certainly different than it was in the beginning of the school year and even in the beginning of this semester, the way things are now makes the new definition of “normal” that we will live with for the next two and a half weeks until the semester ends.
It is not exactly a totally warm environment like it was before when everyone was on the same page and it did not feel like there were cliques or drama, but it’s not harsh and cold either. Everyone just does her own thing and we live together civilly with an air of friendliness. Luckily, tension never got so bad that we felt really uncomfortable with each other. That would certainly complicate things.
The end of the semester is dishing out a lot of homework, and most of the time, even when we are all in the room, is spent in silence with only the faint tapping of keyboards drifting to our ears. It seems like the only bursts of energy come in the morning when we are rushing to get out after a late night of studying or crawling into bed when we can finally take a break to sleep.
It is a little disappointing to see how the dynamic of the entire group has changed, but I feel like my relationship with each person individually has grown for the better. After all, we were all thrown into this situation as random strangers and have accomplished a lot in terms of building relationships with each other and learning how to live with people; I am proud of that. Looking back to the beginning of the year, it is strange to see how what I thought of as “normal” among the roommates has changed, but I can see for sure it is something that I experienced before but never recognized.
It is not exactly a totally warm environment like it was before when everyone was on the same page and it did not feel like there were cliques or drama, but it’s not harsh and cold either. Everyone just does her own thing and we live together civilly with an air of friendliness. Luckily, tension never got so bad that we felt really uncomfortable with each other. That would certainly complicate things.
The end of the semester is dishing out a lot of homework, and most of the time, even when we are all in the room, is spent in silence with only the faint tapping of keyboards drifting to our ears. It seems like the only bursts of energy come in the morning when we are rushing to get out after a late night of studying or crawling into bed when we can finally take a break to sleep.
It is a little disappointing to see how the dynamic of the entire group has changed, but I feel like my relationship with each person individually has grown for the better. After all, we were all thrown into this situation as random strangers and have accomplished a lot in terms of building relationships with each other and learning how to live with people; I am proud of that. Looking back to the beginning of the year, it is strange to see how what I thought of as “normal” among the roommates has changed, but I can see for sure it is something that I experienced before but never recognized.
Thursday, April 5, 2012
Close Call
Well, I called it. The first major conflict did occur, and everyone was pretty upset about it. My roommates texted me to come back to the room as soon as possible this weekend because we needed to have a talk with everyone together to make sure we shared the same feelings and addressed the problems at hand. What happened differently than the usual things that have been going on recently? This time, people came back to the room to have a guy stumble in and then decide to go onto the bed of one of our roommates. For a while, people did not know he was there because only two of them saw him come in. But, when people did see him (asleep), some did not recognize him at all and a few others recognized him as someone who lived on the floor above us. Either way, it is shocking to come in, go about your business before climbing into, and THEN realize that there was guy in the room the whole time.
When I got there after rushing back by myself at night, I first wanted to get him out of our room because he was left there unattended when the rest of the roommates decided to go downstairs to talk because they felt awkward in the room. However, when I went up, he was too big for me, or any of us to move, and in such a “deep sleep” that he would not wake up, or even react. That was frustrating to say the least. Instead, I tried calling the roommate who is friends with him, but it was also a few calls before I got an answer from her. Also frustrating. But, what frustrated everyone was that when they told her they felt uncomfortable with him there (and the fact that none of us were forewarned) and politely asked for her to tell him to leave the room, she ignored the request and went instead to sleep somewhere else. Needless to say, a disagreement broke out.
The talk between the group of us addressed that, and eventually we came to the conclusion that we are all guilty of not saying something when we have felt uncomfortable in the room, and the reason we have never said anything is because it will be taken personally and spitefully instead of respectfully. When people asked for him to leave, it was because it felt weird to have someone unaccompanied in the room with whom we were not friends; it was not supposed to be a big deal for him to go upstairs to his room, but it was taken personally, and responded to that way when we were supposed to “deal with it.” Hopefully all the roommates will keep the result of the talk in mind from here on out. If not, something like this could happen again, and it could be worse.
When I got there after rushing back by myself at night, I first wanted to get him out of our room because he was left there unattended when the rest of the roommates decided to go downstairs to talk because they felt awkward in the room. However, when I went up, he was too big for me, or any of us to move, and in such a “deep sleep” that he would not wake up, or even react. That was frustrating to say the least. Instead, I tried calling the roommate who is friends with him, but it was also a few calls before I got an answer from her. Also frustrating. But, what frustrated everyone was that when they told her they felt uncomfortable with him there (and the fact that none of us were forewarned) and politely asked for her to tell him to leave the room, she ignored the request and went instead to sleep somewhere else. Needless to say, a disagreement broke out.
The talk between the group of us addressed that, and eventually we came to the conclusion that we are all guilty of not saying something when we have felt uncomfortable in the room, and the reason we have never said anything is because it will be taken personally and spitefully instead of respectfully. When people asked for him to leave, it was because it felt weird to have someone unaccompanied in the room with whom we were not friends; it was not supposed to be a big deal for him to go upstairs to his room, but it was taken personally, and responded to that way when we were supposed to “deal with it.” Hopefully all the roommates will keep the result of the talk in mind from here on out. If not, something like this could happen again, and it could be worse.
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