Roommate Fate...?

For the past nine months, I have lived with a girl who I was chosen to room with by Iowa State. There was no searching on Facebook for someone similar to me, no roommate searching website, just a whole lot of faith in Iowa State’s ability to choose someone normal for me to share my 15’ x 11’ room with for my freshman year of college. That takes a lot of faith.

The day that my roommate’s name was posted I was immediately on Facebook with my family creeping on this girl who seemed normal. Knowing that she lived a mere 40 minutes from my hometown was definitely reassuring and it appeared she was in choir, like I was.

Day 1 at ISU. Stranger roomies.

We had a few small conversations to decide who would bring what to our room, the color scheme of red, black and white, and to share some basic information about ourselves. This girl seemed really sweet, but with Facebook as my only source, anyone can make himself or herself seem normal.

Move-in day came along fast and soon this girl and I were living together. Our moms took the awkward picture of the two of us in our new room, basically strangers, and we were off. Our schedules were compared, our sleeping schedules decided, our space divvied out, and soon we had our own little home in Maple 818. 

Battle of the can opener. First semester adventure.

My roommate, Rachel, has turned out to be an unbelievably kind and caring person, but more importantly she has become a trusted friend whom I will be forever grateful for.

The friendship between two girls stuck in an extremely small space together may seem inevitable, but the two of us are very different. I am extremely social, sarcastic, loud, and probably talk more than anyone and at 100 mph. Rachel is much more quiet and subdued, a great listener and a determined student. (Well, she was originally not very outspoken at least.)

An image of our friendship. Dressed up and dressed down...

Two very different personalities have created quite the friendship. Our room is covered in post-its quoting silly things we’ve said. My computer is full of videos of the two of us dancing around and lip-syncing to a variety of songs. My TV provides the daily Friends episodes and Rachel’s microwave is the mastermind behind dozens of mugs of hot chocolate over the year. We’ve become quite the team.

If there’s ever a time when I’m having a weak moment, Rachel feeds me exactly what I need to hear or leaves me to my headphones and time alone. If she’s having a meltdown over something I think is hilarious, I do my best to try not to laugh and listen to her calm herself down by talking about it. We complement each other in our own special way, I suppose.

All dressed up!

Freshman year is hard and we’ve created our safe place of Maple 818. If this isn’t home, than I’m not sure what is. And if this isn’t friendship, I’m not so sure I know what friendship is. My first roommate, Rachel, will always be a wonderful, hilarious, and surprising memory in my mind and forever a close friend. ♥