Roomzillas

So! I thought it was time for a new post. What other might I talk about that's related to college while I'm still on my summer vacation? Roommates!

I have never experienced the sole, well, experience, of living with somebody else, much less in the same room. It wasn't the same as spending a week at the dorm at VSDB. It wasn't like living with my parents at all. Bear in mind, I'd been lamenting about the hell I was going through from living with my father (that's a whole 'nother post) after my mother finally left him. I was still incredibly close to my mother and sick of my father, so coming to Gallaudet to be on my own was a momentary blessing.


At first my assigned roommate was somebody that I knew and simply did not want to live with (he was actually the one who told me and asked to change roomies) so I asked for a reassignment. I got paired up with a guy whose name seem familiar. I went around and dug up dirt on him. We'd met him on the Academic Bowl sometime ago. West Virginia. Football player. All-around asshole. Was this somebody that I'd want to live with, especially given the fact that I was a bubbly, unpredictable gay guy? So of course, I worried and laboured over that for several weeks before finally going to Gally. He never showed up. I had the whole room to myself. I asked around, and found out he just wasn't coming at all. Ye-es!

But of course, there was a time early in the first semester where people could move around and pick people they'd prefer over their current roomies. My best friend Elisy was stuck with a girl who was obsessed with her friends from a faraway state, of whom Elisy knew nothing about. Another friend was stuck with somebody who didn't shower, pick up their dirty clothes, and just stunk. Remember that guy who bluntly told me he didn't want to be roomies with me? He got stuck with this excessively irritating guy who wouldn't shut up. So that day was an opportunity for them to change around and live with somebody they wanted to, but I couldn't live by myself. Stupid rules. I was evidently put together with this guy whose roommate never showed up either, Gabriel Pasnam.

He was an absolute pussy. I say that with love, but at that time he was meek and terrified of me. I went out of my way to be nice to him, but of course he got on my nerves with his constant and profuse apologies, his paranoia, and his naivety. He was known as Gaby and famous for his apple-red cheeks and incredible shyness.

One night I was sleeping by some miracle, when somebody grabbed my shoulder and pulled me from sleep. It was one of the resident adviser and the fire alarm was going off, blinding me. I was confused, then surprised to find my roommate Gaby gone. I left the dorm and forgot my key to the room, so I found Gaby to follow him back into our room.

"Hi, I forgot my key," I said.
"I'm so sorry. I'm so sorry," he trembled.
"Calm down, okay, where were you?"
"I didn't want to wake you up!" he clamored.
"What? Why?" I was in disbelief.
"I didn't want to make you mad!"

Here I was living with somebody who would soon leave me to burn to a crisp than wake me up if there was going to be a fire. Somebody who fell to their knees every time I came into the room. Somebody who had to ask me for permission on everything. I had had enough and next the few days I was just trying to avoid him. I finally asked him after I've calmed down reasonably enough.

It was because of how I always seem angry. He's also hard of hearing and new to the whole signing and the deaf culture, so I didn't blame him. I'm keen at being expressive with my face, so to him that seem like I was always pissed about something. After winter break, everything seem to improve, from the layout of our room to our relationship. It went from a hospital room to a typical guy dorm room, and it went from scared shit v.s. insufferably annoyed to pleasant, normal roommates -- respectively.

I'm like a big brother to him who lets him in the whole corrupted world about girls, sex, alcohol, the dirt on other people, and whatnot. Gaby is really a good person, and I'm happy to be roomed with him -- I mean, compared to all those other guys. We're rooming again this fall at Benson Hall! I was just lucky to have a good roommate from the start -- well, from the delayed start anyway.