To the Roomie!

I don’t wish a bad roommate to anyone because it sucks too much. I can tell by own experiences.

Share a super tiny apartment or even worst, a one-bedroom space, with someone let’s say, different from you who you don’t get along well with, not to say weird or complicated, well, sucks! It makes you unhappy, stressed only about thinking on who you are going to see when get home. I am sure no one needs one more reason to be stressed about, we already have enough from work and life in general. Roommates are supposed to be cool, chill and make your life a little more pleasant.

When in college, I had both, cool and not so cool roommates. If you are lucky enough to share the room with someone you already know, great! Otherwise, you better be lucky and get a decent one who you can connect with, or at least one that does not bother or better, spend most of the time somewhere else besides the dorm so you have the room to yourself most of the time. It’s incredible how a good roomie can make life in college so much better, otherwise it can be miserable.

There is nothing better then, on your way home, have that nice feeling of having a true friend waiting for you. Someone you can talk with about your day, feelings, worries and plans, someone you can cry to, laugh with and the most important, go get food and drinks and binge-watch Breaking Bad.

I felt blessed my first two years in college when I had an awesome roommate who I met at college and easily became a close friend. Our college was in the middle of nowhere, nothing to do and nowhere to go but, still, once I had a roommate I trusted and admired, those first two years were not boring at all. We became so close to the point one didn’t go anywhere without the other. When that happens, you realize the two of you have become a package. Either both go, or both stay.

True is, deep inside you know that you may be that anti-social kind of person or super shy who doesn’t know anyone else besides you roommate. Whatever it is, it doesn’t really matter because both like the company from each other and you are friends. I am all about having a few good ones instead of many wasting your time.

Being a good roommate demands effort and commitment, just like in a relationship. You must respect, accept, understand and care about to make it work. It feels so good when the two of you try to find a TV-series both want to watch, although one is more on The Walking Dead side and the other on The New Girl. It feels good when you two have different music preferences, but one always respects the other when playing it loud. It fells even better when there is a common food taste, so you can go together to that cheap Chinese buffet every week.

A cool roomie becomes your family. You spend holidays together because both are away from home. Then you two get sad because you wanted to be with your family eating some good food but instead you are stuck with your roommate who cooks as bad as you do. At least you have each other and at the end, both decide to go out and get drunk and celebrate your lives and family.

About the not so cool roommates, there is always that one who stays home the entire time. When in school, I always wondered if the person was enrolled in any classes. There is the loud and disrespectful one, who never uses headphones when watching Netflix in the computer even when you are clearly trying to sleep or study. I have had one like that and don’t wish the same to anyone. I mean, it should be common sense and respect for the other. The worst ones, the ones who are on the phone all the time, on the speaker. They speak ten times a day with the same person, usually the boyfriend or girlfriend and they are loud. At some point you realize you know the person they speak on the speaker better than you know the person you share the room with.

Privacy in one small space is complicated. If you got a roomie who speaks on the phone and is on the room all the time, I feel sorry, I had just the same. Its nice to have some privacy occasionally so you can change clothes without having to go into the bathroom where the floor is wet because you just showered, and you are putting your pants on and it touches the floor. And of course, so you could do your physiological necessities without having to turn the shower on because you are worried about the natural noisy your body can make after eating all that Mexican food at the cafeteria.

Finally, there are the ones who try too hard to be cool. They talk about their personal lives, what they did and about random stuff you are not interested in and they keep answering questions you did not ask. You try to ignore but they seem not affected by that and, instead, they somehow think you really want to know all that weird stuff they talk about. At the end you just wish them to leave you alone and stay quiet.

Its not easy to find a good one, but when, if, you do, make sure to enjoy the company the most you can because it is for a limited time. In my case, I really appreciate my current roommate. We are different, but we understand and respect each other. We share, we learn, and we certainly have fun together. If you already got a good one as well, you know what I am talking about.