Roommates

As I’ve probably mentioned countless times already, I went to college at the University of Maryland, College Park (UMCP).  I couldn’t get into West Point, and with my GPA and SAT scores, plus my parents being from Maryland, I was guaranteed admission and in-state tuition at Maryland’s state university.  Moreover, the College Park (main/flagship) campus is huge, beautiful, and conveniently located just outside of DC and close by to Gaithersburg, where I grew up.  Though I had really wanted to go to West Point, I wasn’t too disappointed to be going to UMCP.   I didn’t want a small campus in the middle of nowhere, nor a city campus like Boston University or George Washington University.  UMCP gets on screen for “National Treasure” (Cage’s character consults an expert on campus) and “St Elmo’s Fire” (Frat Row for Rob Lowe’s character). 

Unless you either avoid college or spend it commuting from home, you’ll probably spend it with roommates.  Freshmen start out with doubles, working their way to a single by senior year.  My friends Phil and Baron even went off-campus, which changes the picture slightly.   With my parents overseas all four years of my journey at UMCP, commuting from home was not an option (though my brother still stayed on campus his senior year even with my family back in Gaithersburg by then) and my father deemed living off campus not worth the hassle of giving up the convenient ability to walk to class.  Anyhow.

I’ll use first names, adding last initials if necessary to distinguish parties with the same first name.  The high rise dorms were named after Maryland county seats, e.g. Hagerstown, Bel Air, Ellicott, (though I’ve yet to see a Rockville Hall), whereas the low rise dorms were named after counties in Maryland.   In a double you share the room with a roommate, whereas a single you have to yourself.   Depending on the circumstances, you might have a double to yourself (see below). 

With one major exception, all my experience with roommates was bad.  Part of the college experience is having to learn how to deal with unpleasant people you don’t like, total strangers who you have to live with.  It’s not on the syllabus but it’s part of what college inevitably teaches you, one “benefit” of living on campus.  Just like how to drink irresponsibly. 

Freshman Year (F86/S87).  Hagerstown Hall (high rise) (double).  Mike P., from Mount Airey, Maryland, my only good roommate for those whole four years.   We got along fine.  During the spring semester he was gone substantially due to chemotherapy.   Since he’s still alive today, and friends on Facebook, I’d say he kicked cancer.   We caught the Jimmy Page concert at the Cap Center in 1988.

Sophomore Year (F87/S88). Talbot Hall (low rise, renovated) (double).   Fall:  Greg.  Spring:  Mike B.   Greg wasn’t too bad, but he did get into a fight with my best friend Phil after a party we threw in our suite.  He transferred to Towson State, north of Baltimore; I believe he was from that area.   Mike B. came in from Denton Hall, a high school buddy of Chip & Woody from Hagerstown.  He was a major league asshole, and got kicked out of the dorm system before Spring Break for a prank he pulled in Denton.  He successfully got into Kappa Alpha fraternity and into their house, later getting Woody and others into KA as well.  Because he was kicked out mid-semester, Mike B. was not replaced for that period and I had the room to myself for the remainder of the semester. 

The minor irony here is that these assclowns were all from Hagerstown, Maryland, yet none of them were living in Hagerstown Hall, where I had been for my freshman year.  Years later I had a few court cases in Washington County, Maryland, of which Hagerstown is the county seat.  So I eventually got to see this small, unimpressive town 30 minutes west of Frederick, the latter being the second largest city in Maryland after the big one, Baltimore.  Oh, and my dad died in the hospital in Hagerstown in December 2004.  Life has a strange sense of humor. 

Junior Year (F88/S89).  Talbot Hall (Fall)/Montgomery Hall (low rise, renovated) (spring).   Fall:  Eric S.  Spring:  John.  Not learning my lesson with Mike B., I pulled in Eric S., another of Woody’s Hagerstown comrades.   Eric S. was just as much an asshole as Mike B.   I wound up moving to Montgomery Hall (finally in the dorm named for the county I was actually from!) for the spring semester, only to get another asshole roommate, John, who racked up $300 phone bill arguing with his GF Mary back in northeastern MD.  His parents finally paid the bill for him that summer after his incessant promises to pay were all bullshit.  By the way, I found out the hard way that Maryland, though not a particularly large state by American standards, is large enough that some parts of it qualify for long distance calling rates.  The more you know…

Senior Year (F89/S90).  Montgomery Hall.   A SINGLE.   The guys in the suite next door, with whom I got along fine (see below) let me know that the guy in their big single, Eric T., would not be coming back in fall, making that room available.  Thanks to them, and a letter to Resident Life, I got it.   Not only that, it was a big single.  Fortunately, Gene, who had the small single, didn’t voice any objection.   Finally I had a decent living situation.

Due to judicious scheduling and course choice, I managed to complete 156 credits and two separate degrees, a BA in Government & Politics and a BS in General Business, in 4 years, though it took a full summer with two sessions (4 classes) between sophomore and junior years, and a half session (2 classes – COBOL and Money & Banking, dead end classes which weren’t prerequites for any other classes).  This allowed me to start law school at George Mason University (now the Antonin Scalia School of Law) in the fall of 1990. 

All summer housing was in New Leonardtown, an apartment complex on the other side of Route 1 back behind Frat Row.  Apparently New Leonardtown was easily able to accommodate all the summer students, as the units were half empty during this time.  These had kitchens.  My buddies Dave B. and Ken were living in Old Leonardtown our senior year, an older set of apartments right next to New Leonardtown, so I spent considerable time hanging out with them there. 

Summer ’88.   A single in New Leonardtown for both sessions, from after Memorial Day to the middle of August, and I finished up the summer with my family up in New York City for the end of August.  Jeff & Dave F. (Diamondback photographer) were in one double, the other single and double being empty.  Dave F. articulated the clever and plausible theory that New Coke was Coke’s way of switching from sugar to high fructose corn syrup in Classic Coke without anyone noticing.  Well, aside from those of us like my brother who can taste the difference and make it a point to buy Mexican Coke, which has sugar.  

My brother actually came down from NYC and stayed with me in the suite for much of the summer.  This was also the summer I got my first car, a 1984 Chevrolet Cavalier, which served us well until 1991.  It was a great summer for concerts:  Pink Floyd, Van Halen Monsters of Rock (Metallica, Dokken, Scorpions, Van Halen) at RFK, Iron Maiden & Judas Priest at the Cap Center, and AC/DC at Madison Square Garden.   

Summer ’90.   A double to myself in new Leonardtown.  I can’t recall who else might have been in the suite, and I was only in it for the first session, going back to Paris in mid-July.  That ended my stay at University of Maryland, College Park. 

Suitemates.   The high rises are all doubles and singles.  In the newly renovated low rises, they had suites without kitchens and either three doubles (Talbot Hall) or two doubles and two singles (Montgomery Hall).  So the suitemates are those in the same suite but not the same room. 

Talbot Hall:  Woody & Chip, Bill D. & Scott, then Chris.   Scott was not an issue, though he moved out, replaced by Chris.  I got along with him even though he didn’t actually like me.  Same deal with Chip & Woody, both from Hagerstown.  I had met Woody at Freshman Orientation and been friends with him during freshman year.  It was a coincidence that I wound up moving to a suite in Talbot Hall that he and Chip also moved into.  Bill D was not a problem either, and he was a former roommate of my buddy Dave.   Bill, Dave & I are still friends today, though I haven’t met Bill since college. 

Montgomery Hall.   Senior year:  Marcus & Jay, AJ & Bill M; Gene in the small single.  Except for Gene, they were all Theta Chi brothers.  Jay actually brought me to a 2 a.m. party at Theta Chi.  Had I not been a senior I might have considered rushing Theta Chi, as I actually got along very well with them. 

Other Roommates.  My best friend Phil was on campus at George Mason University for his first two years, and for much of that time his roommate was a Costa Rican guy, Victor.  They got along fine and even wound up living in a house in Centreville with Victor’s fellow Costa Rican, Mariano.  Baron had a roommate for his first year, in Wicomico Hall, before getting a single in the same dorm the next year and then moving off campus for junior and senior year.  While he was living in Bel Air Hall at the beginning of his college experience, my brother Matt had a roommate, Dave K., from somewhere northwest of Baltimore.  He got along fine with Dave K., later getting a single in Montgomery Hall.  So of all of us, I had by far the worst roommate experience.