Dorm Life: The Good, The Bad, The Horribly Ugly

You can find basic check-off lists for what to bring with you almost anywhere, but there are some obscure things you might want to bring along also. These are some things that I found myself going out and buying after I had moved in and wish I would have thought about before the move.

-> A bug-killer spray, such as Raid. Some dorms have a nasty problem with ants, spiders, or roaches, and you definitely are going to want to have something on hand to attack the little buggers with.

-> A seat-cushion. Most dorms come with a desk and a chair, but the chairs aren't always that comfortable. If you're going to be sitting at the desk to study and do work, you're definitely going to want something to cushion your bottom.

-> Vitamin C. With so many people living so close to each other, it's really easy to get sick. If you take a vitamin everyday, your chances of getting sick are reduced. Trust me, you'll have a lot on your plate with papers and study groups and a social life, you definitely don't want any time taken away from that because you're sick! (Plus, not being in the comfort of your own home with your mom there to comfort you is kind of a nasty shock. Avoid!)

-> A game that a lot of people can play at once. Games are a great way to get to know your classmates and neighbors - rainy days will mean a lot more people meandering about the dorm lounge and halls, looking for something to do. I suggest something quick and easy like MadGab or Uno.

On that fateful move-in day when you're saying goodbye to your parents and getting everything unpacked and put away, it's a good idea to leave your door open so you can see and talk to all your new neighbors who will be passing by your door. You never know; one of your new neighbors might be your new best friend for the rest of your life, and/or one might possibly become the person you hate more than anything else. Either way, you're stuck with 'em for about the next nine months, so you need to know how to deal with any situation that you could find yourself in.

In order to establish a good relationship with your neighbors, it is AMAZINGLY important to remain courteous and respectful of those around you. That means don't blare your music after "quiet hours" are in effect, don't yell in the stairwell, or anything else that is pretty much common sense when it comes to common courtesy. I had a dorm neighbor who actually went out for the night and left music blaring in her room, and therefore had ruined any chance of friendship with the people who lived around her because they had to listen to Usher's U Got It Bad on repeat for five hours blaring from the inside of the empty room right in the middle of the hall. True story. If you show respect to your neighbors, they're going to be more likely to show respect to you.

If you come into a situation where there is tension between you and a new neighbor, you're really going to benefit from being as non-combative as possible. Start by trying to talk to them in a reasonable tone and resolve things peacefully. Sometimes this doesn't always work or isn't possible - that's fine, it's college, not everyone is going to get along. You don't have to like everybody and not everybody has to like you. Let it roll off your shoulders and continue focusing on class and having a supportive friend group. Getting caught up in drama - especially drama at the place you sleep at night - is only going to add unnecessary stress to your life. If somebody or something is making you uncomfortable, go to your R.A. and talk to them about what you're dealing with; they are trained to handle these situations.

There's a lot of ways to make the walls in your dorm colorful without ever having to spend a dime. For instance, you can do a name collage. It's easy to do, and it looks great. Just trace the letters of your name block-style on plain white paper, and cut them out. You might want to use big letter stencils in order to make the letters perfect and uniform. They can be as big as you'd like, but remember that the bigger you cut the letters out, the more work it's going to be. After you have all the letters cut individually, cut phrases and small pictures out of magazines and paste them on the letters, collage-style. The end result looks fantastic.

Another thing you can do is use the Rasterbator to make your own poster using any image of your choice. The cool thing about the Rasterbator is that the images can be made as big or as little as you want them to be. The sky's the limit!

Go look in a pile of old magazines and pull out ads that look cool or pictures of your favorite celebrities. Use these to make a "wallpaper" above your bed or on your door. The variety will look really cool.

Christmas lights are another way to not only decorate your walls, but add a really good source of light. The fluorescent lights in dorm rooms are way too bright and harsh. You can arrange the lights in shapes.

If you're living in the dorm, interaction with the communal bathrooms and showers is pretty much inevitable. A little bit of effort from everyone, however, will keep all of these areas from getting out of hand and totally disgusting.

For instance, when you throw away paper towels after you wash your hands (which you always should, by the way), make sure they go into the trash - not the floor or the sink. Toilets should always be flushed after you use them (you'd be really surprised how many people make it into college without knowing how to flush.) After you shower, you should take a paper towel and grab the hair that accumulated on the drain and throw it away.

Make it a point to take out the trash pretty often, especially if there's food in there. You don't want to have food sitting around in your room all day - that's a definite way to attract bugs.

Don't let laundry accumulate too much. When you do it, make sure you sit in the laundry room until everything's finished. That way you can get your clothes out of the machines when they're done, and the flow goes a lot smoother for everyone else. I would suggest getting a little mesh bag that you can put all of your socks in while they wash so that none of them get seperated or lost or stolen by the ever-so-popular Sock Monster.

As for showers, they're not as bad as on might think... I would advise against bars of soap, because if you drop it on the shower floor, you're definitely NOT going to want to rub it on your body. Liquid body wash works much, much better.

Ultimately, living in a dorm is totally worth all of the annoying, disgusting moments that you will inevitably encounter. You'll meet new people and more than likely, you'll look back on those times as being good ones. If you have the option: do it.