The school year actually went by in a flash. While I was living it, it seemed to take forever, but once it was over, it seemed like it had just started. I was very excited to go home for the summer and to get to spend some quality time with K.

For the summer, I managed to find a job as a temporary receptionist, working for a liability and short-term disability insurance provider. It was a really good summer job. K also had a good job. He was working as an apprentice for a heating and air conditioning company. His major at the time was HVAC, so for him, it was a good introduction into that world.

The summer went by quickly. There wasn’t anything overly exciting that happen that summer. It was, however, the first time K and I experienced relationship troubles. I don’t know what it was, but something felt different about our relationship that summer. Before we knew it, it was time to go back to school.

This time, it was K’s turn to be excited. He was heading off to his first year away from home, and living in a dorm. I was very excited for him, as I knew it would be good for him to get away and grow up and mature a little.

C and I learned that we would be sharing a dorm room with two girls from the U.P. For those of you not familiar with the term “U.P.”, that refers to the Upper Peninsula. And those of us from the Lower Peninsula do tend to refer to those from “up there” as “Yoopers.” There are a lot of stereotypes associated with Yoopers, and unfortunately (and in some cases, fortunately), a lot of them do ring true.

Shortly before school started, we learned that the second Yooper wouldn’t be coming back to CMU. She decided to transfer to the university up there, but her friend would still be coming down. Enter Al (not to be confused with A, who I met my freshman year). Al was a junior that decided to spend another year in the dorms. She was a very nice girl, pretty quiet, and a good student. C and I meshed well with her, and we figured we’d won the dorm lottery considering we only had 3 people in our dorm and we all got along.

Or notsomuch. CMU was packed that year. Enrollment was significantly up, so a lot of the freshman had 5 people in each dorm, which is insane. It was tight with 4. I couldn’t imagine 5. CMU even started letting sophomores move off campus without a medical reason (which they previously wouldn’t do), so a lot of sophomores moved out of the dorms to make room for the incoming freshman. C, Al, and I stayed put in the dorms. I didn’t really want to try and find an apartment after school had already started. But staying put meant that we knew we would eventually have another roommate. And we got one.

Carol moved in a few weeks after school started. Carol was an interesting character. I try not to be too judgmental. (Okay, I lie. I had to laugh at that statement. I might try not to be judgmental, but I am. I need to be honest here.) I knew there were going to be issues with Carol as soon as I met her. She wasn’t like us, and I was surprised when she said she wanted to live with us after meeting us.

Al and Carol shared a room, while C and I shared a room. When you entered our dorm, you entered into a living room of sorts, and then the bedrooms were off to either side, with the bathroom being right next to our bedroom. It was a really nice set up. Of all the things I could say about CMU, I would have to say that they had pretty nice dorms.

Early on in my sophomore year, I discovered Yahoo chat rooms. At that time in my life, I was pretty much a night owl, and I didn’t have early classes (I learned after my freshman year not to schedule 8 a.m. classes!), so I would spend a lot of time on the computer at night. I met an interesting person one night. His screen name was Kashmir. I thought for sure he was from India or something, but once I got to know him, I learned his name was Steve and he was from Kansas, attending college in Oklahoma.

Steve and I developed an online friendship and would often chat about K or his girlfriend, music, school, etc. There were a lot of other “regulars” that I also chatted with. Online chatting became part of my nightly routine, and Steve became a good “friend.”

When I think back to the first part of my sophomore year, three things come to mind. The first is when a cricket found its way into our dorm room. Early one morning, C woke me up and said, “Kristi, is that you?” Now, that might seem like a weird question, but it was really funny because I can make a cricket chirp noise (there is a vlog of it on the blog…but you’ll have to search for it), and C thought that maybe I was doing it in my sleep. Of course I wasn’t. We realized the cricket was between our bunk bed and the wall, so we moved the bed back and I leaned down to see if I could find it. Right at that moment, the cricket leaped into the air, right at me. I abruptly sat up and screamed. Well, my hair then got stuck in the springs of the mattress (remember, bunk beds, so the springs were right above me) and we had a good laugh while we attempted to free my hair. C ended up getting the cricket the following weekend while I was away.

The second memorable moment occurred right before Thanksgiving. C was sitting on her top bunk and I was sitting on the floor. We were both studying for midterms and watching TV when I sneezed. Then she sneezed. Then I sneezed. Then she did. Then I did. And this seriously went on for about a half an hour. Finally, we both looked at one another and said, “I’m sick.” Somehow we both got a cold at the exact same time.

The third most memorable moment was when I went to visit K at his college, and we met up with his cousin, who also attended school there. We had planned to hang out for a bit and then go to a bar to dance or whatever. Well, shortly after getting to his cousin’s dorm, I was handed a shot of Avalanche. Have you ever had that? It’s not pleasant. One shot is like drinking an entire bottle of extremely strong mouthwash. I was disgusted. So, to remedy that, someone handed me a pint of Apple Pucker. I took a sip. And then another. And then another. And before I knew it, I had drank almost the entire pint. I didn’t feel anything until I tried to stand up when it was time to go to the bar. Now, in my freshman post, I said I got drunk for the first time at my sorority date party. That was nothing compared to this. Nothing. The next morning, I experienced my first hangover. That was not pretty.

Next week, I’ll write about the second half of my sophomore year. Things like the most embarrassing apartment hunt ever, how I managed to piss off Carol, and the break-up.