Mood Music: Space Oddity by David Bowie

Who knew that a blackout could cause so much stress in one college dorm hall, well Sweet Hall found that out. For those who never knew, after the Tropical Storm on October 29th through the 30th we had lost power on the Rhode Island College campus. No, it was not the fact we didn't have power or Internet that drove us crazy, it was the fact that it gave us false hope. We would have it for every five to ten minutes and then it would be out for another twenty or thirty minutes.

This was what had driven our RA Sarah to insanity, this week I will share with you guys parts of the duty log and share with you details of the night from hell.

It had all started around 10 PM, Sarah had gone on her second round and I had been sitting at the front desk at my job. She had gone through a few floors and then when she got to the first floor I watched her face drop. "Oh crap!" she had said to herself but we all knew what she was seeing.

Because of the storm, it had rained heavily to the point that the first floor started to flood. Our hall coordinator, her husband and two of our RA's (Including Sarah) had to take three different mops to clean it all up. Us as residents just watched and felt bad or the RA's who had to sit there and clean it up. From there the night had gone smoothly until midnight where the power had gone out in all of the halls (except Penfield)

Tensions had grown higher because the RA's were now on twenty-four-hour watch and getting frustrated with some residents. Which, I honestly do not blame because sometimes we get annoying.

However, we found a way to get sit through the night until two in the morning when the power finally came back on. We had all gone to bed until about 6 AM. Where Sweet Hall had lost power, the only ones to lose power during the day.

This is when I had begun to watch Sarah lose her mind.

I had hung out in my friend's room and was not able to sleep all, so I decided to head downstairs to the lounge and sit with Sarah. She had only gotten about three hours of sleep due to residents waking her up due to no power.

Because apparently, we don't realize that RA's are students and need sleep like we do. Please let them sleep #SupportTheRA.

The hours had gone by and we debated on whether or not any of us were going to class. This was when I watched my RA have her breakdown, it ended in laughs and a bunch of 'oh good lords' but we got through it.

From the hours of 8AM-10:30 AM the power had been turning on and off every 5 to 10 minutes. We had gotten news that the boiler was leaking so that meant we should take a hot shower before you bathed in the waters of the Antarctic. I had looked over at the couch and saw my RA,head down looking like she was about to scream her head off. She was still on call, could not go to bed and just had to sit there the whole day to make sure people got into the building due to no card swipe.

I have to say, you have to be a special individual to be an RA. They honestly have to deal with so many responsibilities and deserve so much credit. In twenty-four hours I watched one RA put up with residents drama, a dorm slowly falling apart on 3 hours of sleep. But, she was still able to be strong and help anyone when they needed it.

She took care of what needed to be done to make dorm life better for us, she even allowed us to joke with her. And let me write this article because we thought this night was hard but hilarious.

So, thank you, Sarah, for everything you had done for us that night. You kept our nerves calm, helped us inside the building if we ran out into the rain and made sure our rooms didn't flood.

You are a wonderful RA, and I don't know what I do without you sometimes. Keep that head on tight girly.