Dorm life: What was college like?

UNC Chapel Hill's campus

I went back to UNC for our homecoming game vs UVA this weekend. There is something so calming about being on that campus. It is eerily peaceful at times. I remember a number of occasions walking back from the library alone at 2 a.m. (I do not suggest doing that, no matter how "safe" a campus seems.)

I think the serenity of my campus is due to the landscape. There are so many trees and beautiful walkways on campus. We used to walk everywhere...which explains why staying in shape was not that hard.

The walkways on campus make travel easy. But you have
to watch out for "brick monsters". 

There are some really old buildings on campus, some dating back over two hundred years. There has also been a lot of fancy renovations that I did not experience as a coed. When I was in college, I lived in a dorm on Carolina's south campus. It now looks like a public housing facility in comparison to the new dorms built right in front of it! 

Manning Drive heading toward
South Campus.

The university has an interesting history that includes some of the buildings being built by slaves and some of the students having slaves with them on campus to carry their books. 

When I was in school, students
fought for recognition of the slaves who
were buried in this cemetery.

Driving up to my old dorm, Eringhaus

I realize that a number of YBBG's readers may not have experienced college or campus life...so let me tell you how it was...

The Old Well was said to bring you
good luck, if you drank from it on the
first day of class your freshman year.

Sharing a space

My dorm room was fairly small, so I had to adjust to sharing a fairly small space. Over my time at UNC I had four different roommates (two were in the summer...one was three out of four years). Learning how to share and resolve conflicts were the keys to getting along. Trust me when I say, having a bad roommate would impact too many aspects of your college life.

We also had to share a bathroom and shower with virtual strangers. We shared a computer lab, laundry room, and other facilities as well.

I lived in a coed dorm, so it was good having guys around to do all the heavy lifting. But they could also be distractions. Think about it...

Walking

Freshmen could not have cars on campus, so we seriously walked and caught rides almost everywhere until we figured out public transportation. Ha! I think it was a mile and a half from my freshman dorm to Franklin Street where all the restaurants and stores were. I also had classes close to Franklin St. So we probably walked ten miles a day! Which explains why I could eat like a pig and not gain weight. When I started catching the bus, that changed. LOL

My college newspaper.

Independence

I seriously had to figure out how to do a lot on my own. Yes, I had chores and stuff at home, but navigating life at school away from parents was a bit challenging. I had to learn how to budget money (ummm...it took me a looooooooong time to figure that out...), to do laundry on my own, to eat properly and balance class work with a social life. 

When I first arrived on campus we did not have cable or internet in the dorm rooms, that came later. Shoot we didn't even have air conditioning in my dorm room. You had to mix studying in with your social calendar. Staying on top of your grades was often forgot until grading period came for many social butterflies. 

I had a fairly sociable group of friends. But we had to also determine, often as a team, with whom to interact and from whom to steer clear. College campuses are open for the most part. This is especially true for Carolina's campus. So students and non-students alike were always around. Plus we sauntered off campus quite often. So you independently have to form the good judgment that your parents had for you in protecting yourself. 

Never a dull moment

Sports were a major draw for me when it came to
choosing UNC.

Think about it. You're on a campus full of teens and barely legals. If we knew how to do anything, it was have fun.

We played hard. Made up games, parties, and sports. To balance that with actually graduating and making it to your next level was challenging for many.

We were in a bubble. Shielded from the "real world" for the most part. However, real life still happened outside of the fun.



It is easier to hang out on the yard than sit in a stuffy classroom. There was always something going on. Shoot many people scheduled their classes around more fun activities like....anything other than going to class. There is an overabundance of access to irresponsibility when you're in college.

There is no such thing as curfews. Excess is the norm. When you're on a campus full of people of various backgrounds, you can get into almost anything...Shoot everything... if that is what you want.

Reality is still reality. Some people get into too much in college. There were people who failed. Bad relationships happened. People who slipped up and got caught out there. There were unwanted pregnancies, jail visits, hospital stays, fights, overdoses, sexual assaults and everything else that happens in the outside world, happening inside our bubble.

Everyone's college experience is different. College was just a microcosm of the outside world. You still had to make decisions that were best for you. Although seemingly a utopia, life still happened inside the bubble. It was not all fun and games and good times.