Having successfully survived the year without killing my room mate (or being killed by her :P), I feel like now would be a good time to reflect upon what it’s like to live with a room mate.

I think it’s important to say that Christie and I don’t share a room, so I can’t comment on what it’s like to have that kind of room mate, but we do share a kitchen, living room, and bathroom.

Christie and I have gotten along very well over the past eight months, which I attribute to two main factors: a) we were good friends before moving in together, and b) we have similar personalities.

Both of us are pretty quiet people, so noise has never been an issue. She likes to shower in the morning, I like to shower at night. We’re both good at having open lines of communication so that things which could potentially turn into problems are dealt with before it gets to that point.

Living with another person has also made me learn about myself: I never new how neat I was until I was sharing a space with another person. Christie is… not as neat as I am, but she’s been doing a really good job of being as neat as she can manage, and I’m doing a good job of letting it go if things aren’t always as pristine as they could be. Originally, we had a cleaning policy of “clean up the mess right after you make it,” but that didn’t always happen, so we made up a simple cleaning schedule, which meant one of us cleaned the counters and the other cleaned the floors on alternating weeks. We both found that a schedule was a good motivator for cleaning.

One thing I loved about having a good friend for a room mate was that if I ever wanted to talk to someone, I could just stick my head out my bedroom door, and then I could go back to studying. I loved the impromptu trips to Menchie’s or outings for Mexican food, evenings spent baking, and afternoons spent lying around and talking. I loved having a place that actually felt like home (the dorms never quite did that for me), and I loved having someone who was waiting for me to get home and caring where I was.

Overall, it’s been a great year and I’m very excited for the next one!