Breaking up is hard to do

Katie D.

June 26, 2009 - 1:14 PM

That's right. It's a breakup story. It's that time of year: classes are over, and people have moved on for the summer. It means a lot of excitement and a lot of heartbreak. And for me this year, it means getting left behind.

This is not a boyfriend blog. This is a roommates blog. A tribute to some fabulous roommates and a wonderful year.

Roommates are frequent subjects of thought, celebration, and woe for college students. We are transient beings, often moving each of the four years we spend in Eugene. I have now experienced three of the most common housing options in Eugene: dorm life, an apartment near campus, and now a house more than a mile and a half from the UO.

I have already written a blog about my life in the dorms, but let me just say briefly that while I loved living in the dorms, the situation with my roommate had nothing to do with my happiness there. In fact, we did not speak to each other by the end of our time together. So sophomore year I was searching for a more harmonious living situation.

Last year I lived in an apartment building right across from the music building on campus. It was convenient and cheap, and I lived with three of my best friends. We decided to live in a quad, which is a four bedroom apartment with private entrances and shared kitchen/living space. It was at The Quad (as we called it) that I learned something new and exciting: that being best friends does not make you good roommates. While we had many good times there, I ended up fighting constantly and passive-aggressively with Ben, who wanted the quad to maintain a cleanliness level that seemed unreasonable to me. Nathan was fine to live with, but often wanted to be entertained, which I rarely had time to do with my busy schedule. Grant and I were basically compatible, although I think it was only Ben's influence that kept Grant's mess from spilling into our shared space.

In any event, it was a very interesting thing to live in an apartment: to be shopping and cooking for myself for the first time, and to be sharing this with three other college students who also didn't really know what they were doing.

This year I lived in a beautiful house in South Eugene. I lived with my friend Sonya, who I met while studying abroad in Chile, and two of her friends, Maddy and Megan. It was a little tense at first. Maddy and Megan weren't immediately thrilled to have a fourth person joining their friendship trio, and Sonya was often occupied and unable to help me navigate these new relationships. We had our standard conflicts over dishes, food, and space usage. Everyone has something that bugs them irrationally, while the person who is committing this offense doesn't even recognize it (example: I often leave the prior DVD out on top of the TV, which drives Maddy crazy. On the other hand, I would sometimes wake up in the morning to find half the cupboard doors and drawers hanging open in the kitchen. Maddening!)

But, to make a long story short, this ended up being an amazing year for housing. We had some great times together as roommates. I got very close with Maddy and Megan at the end of term, partly based on sharing a new passion for the SciFi TV series "Battlestar Gallactica," which sometimes kept us up until 2 am on school nights. We would eat popcorn ala Megan: covered with honey and Parmesan cheese. I participated in a roommate feud based on Maddy's irrational love of Shia LaBuff and Megan's more understandable aversion to him (which included poster wars and guerrilla tactics). Sometimes we had potluck dinners together. We would drink wine and play gin rummy and trash talk each other's card playing abilities. We even have a fake band, Floppy Sleeves and the Tea Kettlers, which features no talent, inside-joke lyrics, and a great deal of semi-hysterical laughter.

What I'm saying on the most basic level is that we learned to live with each other's quirks, and ended up being really close friends.

Which brings us to now. They are all a year older than me, a year ahead in school. I got to see them graduate and meet all their families for a big graduation party at our house. They're off on adventures now, starting new lives and plans away from Eugene (including Maddy's job teaching English in China next September). This leaves me all alone in the house for a month or so before the new roommates move in. I'm excited for next year and for my plans, but that doesn't change my sadness for the ending of this awesome year.

Plus, we've got to finish what we started. As our fans have already lamented, our band has had to temporarily disperse due to irreconcilable geographic differences. But here's a promise to all our fans and to my fabulous roommate friends. Floppy Sleeves and the Tea Kettlers will rise again!