As the school year beckons closer and closer, we soon will be leaving the comforts of our homes — our beds, to be exact. A vital component of any college student's college experience is who they choose to dorm with, and a majority of the time, this plays a major role in determining whether or not they enjoy their semester(s). Initially, I was apprehensive towards the whole idea of dorming, but fortunately, my first year dorming experience could have been worse, but it also could have been better. There are things in which I as a roommate can improve on, so to my future roommate, if you are reading this, I am sorry in advance for these things that may or may not bother you.
Here are five things that I, as your future roommate, should inform you about before the school year starts. I'm working on improving myself. I promise.
I set an insane number of alarms in the morning
GiphyI am an early bird (not by choice) and not too many people are fond of waking up at 7AM for an 8AM class. Because I have an early class in my upcoming semester, I'll have to wake up at 7. Waking up is the easy part, but getting up is the hard part. This is why I set alarms at 7, 7:05, 7:10, 7:15, 7:20, 7:25, and 7:30 so that I'll physically drag myself out of bed by 7:30. If you hear over five alarms going off within the span of 30 minutes, please ignore them and continue to sleep. Eventually, you won't even wake to them... just like me.
I like to not be in the dorm
GiphyI keep myself busy during the school year. I am always at club meetings or campus events in the evenings because those are my break from academics. I know that there may be conflicts in our schedules, but I still hope that you will accompany me as often as you can. Otherwise, I will be missing in action from our dorm room, but I hope that this will not hinder us from growing closer because that is something that I truly want for the both of us and wasn't able to achieve in the past.
I am as nocturnal as an owl
GiphyIn addition to waking up early and not being in the dorm, I tend to sleep at not-so-normal times because I do homework during those not-so-normal times. Because I won't be in my dorm during the day since I will either be in class, at research, shadowing, or at a club meeting or event, this leaves me only the night to catch up on my work, shower, and do my laundry. If you hear the sound of keyboard keys throughout the night, it's me struggling to type out days worth of organic chemistry and biology notes. If you hear the shower water running at 3AM, it's me making the poor choice of showering at 3AM. Look on the bright side: at least you can't hear me folding my laundry.
I rant TOO much
GiphyWhen you first meet me, I come off as shy and maybe a little... awkward, and I tend to be more introverted. It takes me a while to open up, but when I do, you'll probably wish for the former version of me. I can talk A LOT. One moment, I could be ranting about something that bothered me during class and then the next I could be showing you a totally relatable meme on Subtle Asian Traits. When I'm stressed, and I'll definitely be stressed because I'll be taking several of the most demanding science courses, I could go on for hours about how difficult this and that was and how unfair life is. You could watch two full episodes of "MasterChef" and I'll still be talking.
I can be stubborn at times
GiphyThere have been a few times in which I refused to get up out of my seat because I was stuck on an assignment or struggling to understand what I'm reading in textbooks. I remember when I stayed up until almost sunrise to finish one of my virtual labs, and I learned to never do that again. EVER. I'm the type of individual who must complete a task (if and when possible) before moving onto the next. I may skip breakfast and eat an extremely late lunch (you might as well consider it dinner) to finish whatever I'm doing. If you see me like this, PLEASE try to convince me to take a break before I drive myself crazy, even though it may be difficult.