A living arrangement tangent of sorts

It’s an interesting thing to live alone. Most of the time I absolutely love it. It’s nice that things stay put (usually) where I leave them, and that the temperature is completely under my control. What? I don’t have control issues. Anyway. I enjoy being able to watch TV whenever, or sit all day with the TV off, reading or staring out the window. I get the bathroom when I want, and I have an entire apartment in which to store things. No sharing of space. I don’t do well with sharing. I failed kindergarten. (I didn’t really, but it sounds good. No, it actually doesn’t. What am I talking about?)

Anyways. When you live alone, you get very used to being alone. Duh, I know, but I think that living alone has helped me to learn to be alone other places as well. In college, I never liked going anywhere alone. It stressed me out if I had to go eat at the Commons alone. It’s still not my favorite thing to eat alone in public, but I have had to do it enough (partially because of my job), that it doesn’t really bother me. In college, if I had to go to the store, I would find a buddy. Now I prefer to shop alone. I feel like living by myself has forced me to become a more independent and self-sufficient person. Sometimes a little too self-sufficient.
Living alone can be very lonely. Today, after an absolutely terrible session, I just wanted to be able to come home and decompress with someone. Talk about what was going on, and then move on. Besides the practical side, like having someone to split rent and bills, I miss having a roommate. Someone to laugh with and chat with. Someone to share dinners with. Someone to know where I am.

I have had some of the best roommates in the world. My sister, of course, was my first “roommate.” We had some good years. We had tape down the middle of our room in Ackley, IA. Her side was always neat as a pin, while mine had very little floor visible. She used to enjoy forcing me to play school (she would let me go for "recess," complete my homework for me, purposely answering questions incorrectly, and then mark them wrong in a red pen) or kicking me out when she had friends over. I enjoyed putting her things out of place and annoying her by being sickeningly cute when she had friends over so they would want to play with me. We lived together until I was in fourth grade. Even back then, and despite her being a typical "older sister," I remember appreciating having someone else around. It was weird staying in a room by myself. Of course, I got used to it. In high school I had the whole basement to myself, but I could always hear my parents moving around upstairs.

Kaija was my freshman year roommate. We braved the new world of college together. We had our ups and downs, but we’re still good friends. Solberg 101 forever! (Wait…was that our room?) We always enjoyed having very unique names together. We bonded over it. That, and Honors Religion. And our matching gold chairs.

Sophomore year was the year of craziness. I lived with my dear friend Nik. She and I share a brain, and we had things in our room such as the ceiling of hotties above our desk, and our “face door,” which we created way before Facebook. We painted our loft with chalkboard paint and made people sign it when they visited. We played many pranks together. It was a good year.

Apparently this has turned into a roommate rundown. Don’t worry, there are only a few left. My junior year I lived with Kristen. (She just had a baby, by the way. Beautiful baby. :)) We had crabs (the hermit kind). Their names were Skohotentot and Skolinkenlot. I might have named them. We also had special plants called “living stones,” but we called them butt plants, because they looked like little butts. I also lived across from Kristen senior year, when we both had single rooms. We would leave our doors open and it was almost like we were still living together :)

Between my senior year of college and my first year of grad school, I lived with Heidi. Heidi was crazy. She is my only former roommate with whom I have no contact anymore. That’s all I have to say about that.

Going into grad school, I thought I was going to have to live alone. I was at a wedding for a woman who worked in the office where I did work study for four years, and was talking with some of the other student workers. One had graduated a year ahead of me. She was pretty awesome. Her name was Jill. Well, her name still is Jill, actually. :) It just happened that Jill’s roommate was getting married and she was looking for a new place to live. Just like that, I had myself a roommate. That was totally amazing, because I really couldn’t afford to live alone. It was double amazing because Jill turned out to be an awesome roommate and is still a dear friend. We used to sing together and just had really good talks. Oh how I miss my Jilly.

My last roommate was Sarah. It was a similar situation as with Jill. I knew Sarah in college, but we were never super close. However, we both happened to be looking for roommates at the same time and randomly found each other. Living with Sarah was almost like living alone, because our schedules were so opposite. There was just enough of that camaraderie to keep things from being too lonely though.

Long story short…roommates are great. I love living alone, but I think in the right place I would enjoy having a roommate again. A bigger place than my current apartment for sure. In fact, if all my former roommates could live in a house together, life would be perfect. Wait…

Or. I could just get married.

Wow, I need sleep.