Monday, May 16, 2005

My new house

So this post might reveal just how strange I am, but I don't care because I really need to write about this.

This weekend I moved into a new house. I painted my bedroom bright green and everything in it just reeks of my personality. The rest of the house is froofy and smells like girly burning candles, but when you walk into my room it is totally different. It is my haven.

"A haven from what?" you may be asking yourself. Well, let me go on.

I am LDS (Mormon). I went to BYU which is a really conservative LDS private college. In the past 6 years I've lived with 30 people....All of which have also been of my faith. There are a few characteristic behaviors of a typical LDS person: we don't drink, smoke, or have sex out of marriage.

These three things combined mean that I have never experienced a few things.

I've never woken up in the morning and had to wait for my roommate's boyfriend to get out of my shower, making me late to work.

I've never had to deal with coming home and seeing my new roommate wearing nothing but a towel, standing outside her second storey window on the roof of my house having a smoke.

I've never seen people downing a fifth of whiskey at 2 in the afternoon in the bedroom next to mine.

These are all little gems of experiences that I've had in the past 2 days of living at my new place.

I know that Monica isn't LDS and that means that she will be doing things different from me. I fully understand that different isn't bad and I am totally fine with people living their lives the way that makes them happy. I really have no problem with that.

The problem I do have is with Erica. When she was showing me the house I assumed that, since she is also LDS, she shared the same standards that I do. I had my mind set for the way that things were going to be.

Well, after this one weekend I realize that my perception was pretty off and now I have to deal with it.

I'm not being judgmental. I don't care what she does. I DO care that things aren't as they seemed when we made this arrangement. I feel deceived and that is just a crappy way to start out a new living situation.

7 comments:

Anonymous said...
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Anonymous said...

Sorry to hear that. The world is the world. We can't expect much out of it other than poor behavior. ~ Jef

Jenna said...

Betrayed twice in a row. First by your bf, and now by the new housemates!

All kidding aside, best of luck with the new roomates. Remember there is always that blog "I hate my flatmate" or whatever it was called. If you are really frustrated, you can always drop over there and have a look.

Erin said...

I understand the deception. One of my biggest growing experiences was coming to grips with the fact that my friends who are Christians are leading a lifestyle that is NOT what I was raised to believe. The realization that everything is not alright is a new one. Just remember, you're not in Kansas anymore, this is a bigger, better and scarier world that you need to make an impact in. Don't back down into a hole, shine a light.

Fei said...

I want to be accepting of everyone's choices and not judge as well, but I've always had a harder time watching members live the lifestyle of the world.

What bothers me isn't so much what they do, but that they do those things under the LDS label. In my head, I think "So you're one of those people that make us look bad!

Imagine my culture shock when I left my small branch in Malaysia where we were so sheltered and would gasp at a member wearing a sleeveless tops, to BYUH, where I'm always one of 3 people in one piece swimsuits on the beach.

I had to learn not to let it bother me, but I have to admit that while I understand others don't place the same ammount of importance on modesty, I always have to push aside disappointment when I discover a friend of mine owns a bikini.

Aaaaah. Must. Not. Judge.

Unknown said...

I really admire your acceptance and non-judgemental attitude towards those who are different than you.

That said, I agree that it was completely unfair of her to neglect to share her lifestyle deviations with you. It put you in an uncomfortable situation and was disrespectful.

Mrs. Architect said...

100% ditto to gff. Living in a 4 bedroom apt in college for three years, I have had my share of interesting and awful experiences with roommates. I am surprised that she didn't disclose some of that with you because before moving in with my current roommate, I made it clear how often my boyfriend would be over, my views vs his on partying etc (which are exactly the same) and that sort of stuff, because I KNOW people are different and you can't assume anything.

I hope it starts getting better. My non-confrentational self just hid in my room and avoided situations which was to my demise because it withered some friendships that would have probably blossomed instead if I had come forth and been honest about my feelings.