I made the unpopular decision to room with a friend from high school during my freshman year of college. Originally, I was set on rooming random. I told all my friends that I did not want to room with anyone I knew because I wanted to meet new people. I thought I should “branch out” and start this new chapter in my life without anything holding me back. Every college student I knew said that rooming random was a great decision because all you need out of a roommate is someone who you can live with; you do not need them to be your best friend.
I took everyone’s advice to heart until the day I attended an AP calculus review session at my high school on a Saturday morning in early May. My friend, Grace, had also recently committed to Boston College, and she was also attending the review session. We started chatting about rooming, and my fears of getting a psychotic roommate. That was when Grace decided to make a passive aggressive comment about how I didn’t want to room with her. I was initially taken aback, but then I asked her why she had not asked me to room. I realized I already knew the answer: I had made it known that I wanted to room random. But Grace’s passive aggressive comment made me think differently, and eventually changed my mind completely.
After a year as roommates, I would never take back my decision to room with Grace for the world. Grace and I went from being “class friends” to “best friends.” I still don’t know how I would make it through an average day at college without her. The first couple weeks of school, the two of us stayed up talking about how scared we were of finding friends besides each other (note: we did find friends). We joined clubs together, never ate alone, and joined each other at the library. It was a comforting feeling that as I met new people who I knew nothing about, I had one person I could definitively trust had my back.
Our room has become a home that I come back to after a long day; not a place, I can only sleep in because I want to avoid my roommate. Because the two of us are both in the same friend group, we love having people in our room. There is no awkward tension of one roommate having their respective friend group over and the other roommate getting angry about it. Our room has become a place that each of us feels equally comfortable to do whatever we want. Grace and I will stay up late in our room discussing our days or our problems, or we will give each other much-needed homework breaks. We naturally respect each other’s space and boundaries, as friends would do.
The best part of rooming with someone from high school is that even though you are starting a new chapter of your life, you still have someone who understands your last chapter. When I talk about events I participated in during high school, I can have Grace back me up when we try to explain them to other people. When I talk about my best friends from high school, I already know Grace knows them too. Even though it is important to think ahead to the next chapter and not get hooked in the past, it is important to remember that your past is part of you and made you into the person you are today. It’s important to keep people around who can remember that, but also push you to keep changing when you have new beginnings.
Next year, Grace and I will be roommates once again. Looks like the decision I made after an AP Calculus review course was a pretty good one.
