As a girl that has shared a room with her sister for 16 years and lived alone in a dorm for one year, I'm not used to having new people in my living space.
Moving into my new apartment with three new roommates made me slightly nervous. Not only had I never lived with anyone else besides my family, but I was being handed this new sense of independence that I hadn't had before. When I lived in my dorm during my freshman year of college, I still felt this need to always be with my parents. I went home a lot of weekends that year because I only lived 20 minutes away. Now, I'm living with three friends and am really in the center of University of life. Needless to say, it's been three weeks and I'd say things are going pretty well.
One of the biggest perks of living with your friends is that you get to see them more than usual. If any of you, like me, have friends who are in like six different student groups and are majoring in anything business, you probably see them only twice a semester. Now, I get to see them every day and actually talk to them for more than 20 minutes.
Second, are the roommate outings. Whether it be Target, a Chinese Restaurant or just down to the lobby, there's a higher sense of adventure. Everything is more fun and entertaining. My bank account may drop hastily when I'm out with them and I may eat more junk food than I should, but they're memories for the books.
But yes, sometimes there can be downsides. Being as introverted as one can be, sometimes I need a lot of time to myself. And it's hard to find that when you have roommates. Whether that's not being able to find a solitary enough space in which to hang out or being roped into hour-long conversations, it's easy to want to crawl into bed and not talk to anyone for a couple hours. If you're unlucky and get roommates who don't understand your need to be alone, they might assume that you hate them. Luckily for me, all of my roommates are in some way introverted.
Second, are all the little nuts and bolts that come with living with me. I am a person that does things I shouldn't do and has ways that certain things should be done. Basically, I talk to myself quite often, leave things everywhere, and have a tendency towards leave lights on all the time. Are these all things I should probably work on? Probably. And I am working on it. One long step at a time.
Would I trade living with my friends for anyone else? No way. Having movie nights, grocery trips and early morning runs to IKEA can be highlights of my week. Being able to feel more connected to a group of people is euphoric and probably won't happen again in this way ever. Although it's only been three weeks with this roommate bunch, I'd say the rest of the year is going to go pretty well.
