College dorm or retirement home? by Judy Fowler

 

  

You chose the campus. 

Either you sought freedom from your family, or your family sought freedom from you. When moving day arrives, the transition from home to communal residence feels permanent.

You meet other newbies and exchange names. Some of your new acquaintances immediately invite you to drink with them in their rooms. Everyone knows the lyrics to the same music. 

The residence manager is annoyingly motherly. She calls you by your first name and eyeballs your friends. Having meals available is a perk until you gain the freshman ten. Your body is losing its shape from too many free ice cream sundaes at the welcome bar and not taking the stairs. 

Due to the limited square footage of your new living space, you had to leave behind many of your possessions. Many of the residents had to leave their cars behind. There's a shuttle bus, which would be cooler if it didn't advertise where you live.  

You almost miss that noisy, code-violating neighbor from the cul de sac now that you're forced to get along with a complainer down the hall who tells management that your door decorations are a fire hazard.

You go to events only because someone left a flier about it near the mailboxes. That's how you ended up learning "How to Make Donuts in an Air Fryer" in the game room on a Saturday afternoon. Card sharks a few feet away encourage you to make more. It's no different than that dateless Saturday night long ago when you learned to make beer-drenched fondue on a hotplate for your roommate's friends while they played Scrabble for money.

The building has an impressive lobby, which no one spends more time in than they absolutely have to. Guests must sign in. There needs to be somewhere to put your family up when they visit, but there isn't.    

The whole first year is a yay-boo. Yay, at seventeen, you escaped your kid sister's knock-knock jokes; boo, you can't play with the family dog. Yay, at seventy, you escaped weekly lawn-mowing, but boo,  you miss watching your garden come up in the spring. 

You get a new nickname. Old friends want to know why your residence friends call you "Miss Sunshine" (because I smile in the morning) or "Lady Godiva" (someone spotted me wearing a skimpy robe one day when I took my trash to the incinerator chute). 

The residence is a hotbed of gossip. If you have a special someone, the two of you get a "couple name," and everyone in the building treats you like you're famous. If your sweetheart transfers his affection to someone else on the premises, you must pretend it's no big deal when you hear them called by their "couple" name.  

One night, someone who lives below you is alarmed by the sound of your drapes being pulled shut. They think you've had a heart attack and call the night staff to conduct a wellness check. In college, you tap-danced after hours, and the night staff got a call then, too. Nothing you do feels private anymore.

You move out after two years. Neither the management nor your family approve of your decision.  

 [This post is in memory of author Skip McLamb, 74, who died on October 23, 2024, and who came up with some of these comparisons in the winter of 2022.]