Apartment living: A double-edged sword

Living in an apartment is a double-edged sword.

There’s the increased independence from life in the dorms – being able to have parties (legitimate ones, anyway), and being able to cook for yourself on a consistent basis.

But then again, there’s the increased independence from life in the dorms – having to pay monthly bills, dealing with maintaining more than one half of a 30 square-foot area and cleaning up after that meal you just spent about a half hour cooking for yourself.

While some dormers have to cope with these responsibilities, albeit infrequently, there isn’t much that can prepare you for the added stress – and joy, of course – of living in your own place.

It’s nice to know on any given weekend there will be something to do that doesn’t involve a frat house or a party I got invited to over Facebook. Then again, I never realized how much cleaning up after my own party sucks – especially when someone you don’t know pukes in your shower.

It’s great to not wake up to a fire alarm at 5 a.m. nearly every day of the week like I did while living in Read Center last year.

However, I now have a new alarm, thanks to paper-thin walls and my roommate Darrell, whose snore sounds a bit like the sound a charging rhino might make.

It’s been fantastic to have my own space and my own room for whenever I need to get
homework done or just want some time to myself.

What’s become clear, though, is the apartment lifestyle has made me want to focus on academia a lot less than before, which, judging by my GPA, was not much.

I found my apartment on a whim when my friend and I decided to drive around, look at names, and text them to ourselves.

We’d decided, as frugal out-of-state students, that living in Willkie Quad was not worth the expense. Our search led us to Campus Corner.

The $379-per-month price tag – including utilities and some semblance of furniture – seemed fair to us. The volleyball court out by the pool, the tennis courts and the basketball courts were attractive. And the fact that we would be surrounded by other students but not have to live in the Villas, where 19- to 22-year-old livers go to die, was somewhat appealing.

So three of my other floormates from freshman year and I made our choice. And none of us regret it.

Our living space might be cleaned far less frequently than I’d like to admit. The tiles in our so-called “kitchen area” might be stained and, at times, sticky from beer spills and other liquor-induced mishaps. There might be random buttons scattered throughout the house for emergencies, similar to a retirement home.

But that’s what it is – a home. A place we all love. At the end of the day, I have a place I can go and try to fall asleep without metal music blaring from someone’s computer 15 feet from me.

And that, my friends, makes any cuts from that double-edged sword worthwhile.