I don’t think I ever appreciated life in a freshman dorm so much until this week, when my roommates and I got our first healthy dose of “the real world.”
Being juniors, we enjoyed the customary kick in the posterior from BC and heard the snickering words “have fun in your new apartment and we’ll see you again next year” behind us as the door to campus living slammed shut.
So, during this past week, we’ve found out that the “real world” doesn’t have phone and Ethernet lines that are all prim and proper and waiting for you. The “real world” doesn’t always offer you relatively well painted walls or the comfort of campus police and blue lights on the horizon.
And there’s no BC cable.
My first real wave of fear came from the knowledge that electricity, water, phones and cable TV, the basic necessities, don’t sit there waiting for your use.
I stood dumbfounded when I was told that all I needed to do was call the phone company to set up our phone line.
This whole phrase seemed like one big oxymoron to me, so I panicked, thinking that I was now paying the price for not having learned telepathy at a young age. It certainly would have been cheaper!
After that first, big hurdle was crossed, I began to move into my room.
As we were setting up, the guys who had lived in our pad before us were doing their final cleanup and nonchalantly let us know that the apartment had been broken into two weeks earlier.
“Oh, it’s no real big deal,” one of them said, “they only stole two computers.”
Oh, yeah, no big deal.
Considering that my window is on the first floor and the frame is in such bad shape that a thief could probably just pull it straight out of the wall and step into my room, I didn’t find this news an easy pill to swallow.
I called my most gracious landlord and notified him of a few repairs that might be necessary to ensure the safety of my belongings and body. I also contemplated putting a note on my window:
TO PROSPECTIVE THIEF (please read the following):
1. IF YOU MUST TAKE ALL MY WORLDLY BELONGINGS, AT LEAST REPLACE THE WINDOWFRAME ON THE WAY OUT.
2. PLEASE USE CAUTION BEFORE BREAKING AND ENTERING, THE WINDOWSILL IS FRESHLY PAINTED.
3.UPON ESCAPING, PLEASE PULL DOWN SCREEN—THE BUGS ARE EVERYWHERE THIS TIME OF YEAR.
I don’t think my demands are too unreasonable. And, chances are, he’ll be so taken by my politeness that he’ll just decide there are other juniors living off campus he can pilfer.
One final note (for now) on this whole off-campus experience (well, it’s more of a question, really): What happens to all that furniture on the side of the road that’s not quite good enough for college students, but still shouldn’t be thrown away?
I envision a lost section of the city where various people sit quite comfortably on semi-reclining recliners with their feet up on coffeeless coffee tables surrounded by bookless bookcases and drawerless dressers.
For now, I’ll think of the time in the hopefully distant future when I can look back on these days of third year anxiety and laugh at the fact that I thought these small trials and tribulations would be anything like the real “real world.”
Until then I’ll just tune in to MTV at the 10 spot like everyone else.
That is, if I ever get my cable hooked up.
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