I was counting down the days until I would get that email about who my roommate would be and where I would be living. I was excited, yet nervous. It was going to be strange living with a complete stranger. I had heard so many different stories about how people had bad roommates and they had to move out right away. It never crossed my mind that I would get a bad one. Once I got her name, I sent her a text message and we hit it off when she responded. We had a lot in common and didn’t live that far away from each other. Our towns were less than an hour apart. Three weeks later, I found myself picking her up from the metro train station and we were on our way to a baseball game. At the game, we talked about everything and I knew moving in with her would be a breeze. It turned out, we had way more in common than we thought. We talked about work and how we had a love-hate relationship with it, our favorite sports teams, the type of music we liked and more! It was like we were the best of friends. We both counted down the days until we got to move into college. We were both scared but excited! We talked almost everyday about how excited we were and what we should bring. We compromised on things we should bring for our room that we both could share. I knew rooming with her would be the best year ever!

We’ve been through so many different experiences together. We experienced our first without our parents together, our first college party, our first college homecoming football game and many more exciting adventures! Our nights consisted of late night runs to whiteys, long talks about boys and watching Worst Cooks of America on Netflix. She was my first friend at college who I did almost everything with. She understood all my problems at home, boys who broke my heart and she didn’t judge me for a single thing. She’s the person I can trust almost anything with, and I really mean it.

One night before Christmas break, I had a really bad tooth infection on both sides of my mouth. I was crying at 2 AM and she heard me in the bathroom, moaning in pain. She jumped right out of her bed, drove me to the nearest 24-hour Walgreens and paid for some medicine. She waited until I fell asleep to make sure I was ok. Recently, we both got sick and I was a lot worse than she was. After two weeks of constant coughing, wheezing, runny nose and dizziness, I got worse. My roommate walked in on me crying and she took me straight to the emergency room. It was really late and she stayed with me the entire night. I knew I was lucky enough to have a roommate like her that night. She knew I was nervous because I hate hospitals and she kept cracking jokes just to get my mind off of it.

To my roommate, thanks for dealing with my craziness. Thanks for dealing with my horrible taste in music, loud snoring and never filling the water pitcher up when I finish it. Thanks for driving me to the store to buy groceries or to the mall just to get out. Thanks for letting my friends from home raid our room for my birthday weekend and inviting them into your heart. Thanks for the constant boys talks and making me feel like I’m worth a million bucks. Thanks for always letting me borrow money when I really need it and not nagging me to pay you back. Thanks for letting me take some of your food when you have too much. Thanks for letting me keep my room messy (even though your room is always neat) and not getting so upset about it. Thanks for always making sure I get to my bed and making sure I’m safe after a party off campus. Thanks for all the laughter through the late nights like when I constantly sang “All I Want For Christmas Is You” and would break out the air drums or when you would cough and I would just record you. Overall, thanks for being the best roommate anyone can ask for. I can’t wait to room with you next year and seeing where life takes us during college.