The roommate series: The room roommate

I will begin with an order of the room roommates to keep me on track.

Kiely Smith
Michelle Yorgason
Kiely Smith
Megan Thorley
Charity Bowles
Kiely Smith
Christina Craven
Ashlee Carroll
Melanie
Megan Ward

Did you see some repeats? Yeah! Kiely couldn't keep away from me. :) Or maybe it was the other way around.

So I go off to college and I got myself a sweet gig living not on campus. I felt quite sure that I would have hated on campus life (I know I probably wouldn't have hated it but...I really don't think I would have loved/liked it). So I got a place at Queens Arms, right off the SE corner of campus, near J-Dawgs so...basically I was set. My sister had lived there before her mission and had found it because of my brother who had lived in a nearby house (yeah Pickup Place!) so you know, familial connections.

What with all these connections you'd think I would have come in knowing people. Not so, I knew one girl who had been roommates with my sister, but she was my neighbor and not my roommate. Nikol, however, was great to have next door just so I had at least one friendly face. I had no idea who my roommates would be and to make matters worse, my room roommate didn't arrive until about one day before the semester started, when I had already been in the apartment for a week because of New Student Orientation. All I knew was that her name was Kiely. Well actually I knew how her name was pronounced, I highly expected it was spelled like Kylie or Kiley or some other nonsense. I also thought she was probably tall and blonde and played volleyball. (specific much? Who knows)

Um, Kiely's name is spelled Kiely (which really makes the most sense, if you think about it). Also she is short. And has dark hair and darkish skin (she is sometimes Italian and sometimes Portugese and sometimes Native American and sometimes Asian? And never Irish...haha...). And she might play volleyball for funsies, she is very sporty, but she doesn't play it...often.

So one day I am sitting on my bed reading and in walks Kiely and her friend Jess Pollard. Jess is much more talkative and asks me where I am from, etc. Come to find out she is cousins to a family called The Colvins in Harrisville, a neighboring city. Um yeah...Christopher Colvin and I have been friends since 7th grade and our sisters are BFFs. What? Then Jessica leaves. And Kiely and I sit there, on our beds, and talk for the next few hours completely comfortable from the very beginning. From then on, we were basically inseparable.

Sorry for all the Kiely talk, and I'm not even close to done. If no one minds I will put her at the end because I lived with her the longest and she deserves the most space after putting up with me the longest.

The first summer that I stayed at BYU my sister moved in with me after her mission. It was so awesome! Now, those who know us well know that Michelle and I don't always get along swimmingly. We are of quite different temperments. However, in the stress-free-ness that summer brings, we were a perfect pair. She wasn't taking classes and I only took classes Spring and then mostly chilled and watched funny videos of the Jonas Brothers Summer term. We both just worked and played and shared food and kind of minds? One time we were playing a Cranium game, and in this game you gave clues for something and all of the clues had to start with the same letter. So Michelle looks at me and says "Caterpillar" and I say "Alice in Wonderland". And I was totally right! We then admitted to each other that both of us had actually been thinking of the Cheshire Cat. Uh. Creepy. Sisters. 

After another Fall semester of Kiely (yeah, I even kicked my sister out of that room for Kiely) she abandoned me and went to London. Whatevs. So I got another totally random roommate named Megan Henrie (now Thorley). Now at this time my room was covered in posters of Disney stars. I love Disney. I wondered what my new roommate would think when the first thing she saw would be the Hannah Montana poster on my wall. But don't worry guys, because when that was the first thing she saw then she knew we would be good friends. She had an HSM pillowcase (and dude, I love HSM) and a love for Hannah Montana. We had a lot of awesome things in common, one being that we both have a serious burning love for Valentines Day! I also talked Megan through a lot of pre-marriage things. Learned a lot myself... And I was delighted when she and Tom FINALLY got engaged for reals. Megan was also a wicked fast texter and doesn't have a Facebook. FYI.

That summer I was supposed to be roommate-less and I think I was for a little bit. Charity moved in after a while and was actually signed up for one of the private rooms. But she moved into my room first because her room wasn't available and then she just decided to stay. Because I'm so fun! Or whatever. Charity is actually the sweetest person in existence and I adored her/living with her/just plain knowing her. That summer with her was really fun!

That Fall Kiely came back! Yay! But it wasn't for long. Sadly, that Fall was Kiely's last semester. But one of my other dear friends Christina had moved into our apartment that semester with the intention to become my room roommate when Kiely graduated. Who can blame her really? I'm pretty bombin'. She moved in thinking surely she would see me more often (I tend to jam pack my schedule, it's just how I enjoy living). She probably saw me less. Sorry! I was on SPAC and working at Freshman Academy and taking a full load of classes. But we partook of Valentines celebrations together (I do remember making an awesome list of things we love, one of the longest I've ever made for the Love Game in fact) and talked and did a lot of nothing. We're super good at doing nothing together. It's our specialty.

The story of Ashlee Carroll being my roommate is actually a small miracle. She was in the folk band that plays for PAC. She's an amazing fiddler. Anyway, during the Winter semester we went on a few shows together (remember that terrifying one where we almost died?) and a mid-semester tour. She was actually my very first roommate at a host family's house. But all in all, we weren't very close, just thought each other mutually awesome in passing. Well one day some apartment seekers came by, which happens occasionally during Winter semesters. And it was Ashlee! And I told her about the place and she was hooked and convinced and therefore we were roommates the Spring term before we went to Europe together and the Summer term immediately after Europe. She is the reason for TBE, "the best ever". So that summer was, you know, the best ever.

And then we come to my final year. For my final Fall semester I was with a random again. Melanie. I...honestly don't know her last name. Not because I don't love her but because she is South Korean and I don't want to embarrass myself. Also, sadly, our schedules were basically exact opposites. I got up early in the morning and came home in the evenings. She got up later and went to work in the evenings until after I'd gone to bed. She had a cool music keyboard which she said I could use if I ever wanted, though I never took her up on it (She was a music composition major). And she was very clean and nice and lovely.

AND THEN. To top of my BYU experience, why not room with the very first person you ever met at college. Good idea? Yeah. I thought so. In came Megan-o into the room roommate series. I actually can't remember why I call her Megan-o. But I do. She had come home from her mission early because of a stomach problem that still plagues her and she writes an awesome blog about it. And we had a freaking awesome time man. She kept me in the TMA loop AND the Divine Comedy loop, as she was their stage manager. Coolest roommate ever. And we ate cookie dough. And she made awesome foods for me. I loved having dinner with her! I was student teaching that semester and probably more stressed and irritable than I should have been. But she put up with it well, and even acts like she still likes me. Weird. :)

So. This is super long, but I haven't even paid homage to Kiely yet. So I think I shall do it in a list of awesomeness.

Silly
Football!
Cooking? (ps, how do you measure honey?)
The scenario game (best game ever in which when you are stressed about something and that something is a boy and usually an impending date with him, you create scenarios of what could happen, each one crazier than the last. And they are never in numbered order.)
Studying!
Giggling
Pizza on reading days
Movies
Prison Break
The OC
Buffy
Angel
Commedia D'ell Arte
Backstreet Boys
JONAS BROTHERS IN VEGAS!
No pants
Punching bag
Constitution Day decorations
And finally .... wiener.