The First Year

Life With A Roommate

I can't live with people. I lack the gregarious and compromising personality that would allow me to co-habitat with another human being. My attempts to procure a single room before classes started were met with what loosely translated into, "you're an incoming freshman - fuck off!" So, I was assigned a roommate.

Frankly, I hadn't lived with anyone since my younger brother and I had tried to room together in Puerto Rico. This attempt ended when I decided it would be fun to throw him off of the top bunk of the bunk bed. The kid survived the fall (he didn't move for ten minutes, but survived the fall) and we were separated into different living spaces.

I remember the first time I met the guy. He was from downstate New York, so naturally, moving in for him was a greater ordeal. Being the townie, I was already moved in. We settled our room divisions (my side, your side), got moved in, and set upon living together for the semester.

As I look back upon what happened, and why we couldn't live together, I believe that the problem was stupidly simple: we were too different for each other. I know it sounds trite, but it's true. He loved rap, I loathed rap (particularly one of his favorites - Puff Daddy). He drank and dabbled in narcotics. I've been accused of being straightedge. He was gregarious. I am slow to warm up.

We lived to together peacefully for a while, but the inevitable problems did become to crop up. It was the combination of the little day to day things and the big things that drove us both up the wall. I'd be listening to something; he'd put something on. I'd turn my stereo up, he'd counter (of course, I had the more powerful stereo). I bought a Pink Floyd poster one day. He bought two rap artist posters - Method Man and 2PAC, if I remember correctly.

It was walking in on a beer party one night that really pissed me off. Now, I wouldn't have minded had he told me what he wanted to do. However, he instead had people try to distract me from going to my room. When I finally got inside, there were several people, four or five of whom were sitting on my bed and/or hiding beer under it. I tolerated it for the time being (what could I do?). The end of the night left me babysitting my extremely inebriated roommate after everyone else had left. I didn't sleep very well that night.

It was he that finally decided to move out. He came up to me one day and said that we weren't bonding, as roommates should. He moved out on the day of my birthday in 1998, and we both got along much better, each living in singles.

My Ex-(Girl)friend

When I think of what happened in this situation, I still feel a bit sick. One word permeates the entire narrative: betrayal. Here, I recall, they did the worst thing anyone could do to me. They lied.

My ex-girlfriend, whom I shall refer to as X, in a nutshell, fucked a "friend" of mine, who I will refer to as P. This alone would not have been so bad, but it goes deeper (doesn't it always?).

I really don't think X and I were supposed to ever date in the first place. It just happened without either one of us knowing how or why. She had needed a dance partner and I was available. Basically, her roommate at the time hooked us up to go dancing together. So, that's how it began, week after week, we'd go to dance lessons together. How we ended up an item from that, I'm not sure.

The important thing is that we did end up an item.

At this point in time, I associated (foolishly) with P. P was dating a girl who I had an interest in, but who didn't have an interest in me. In fact, P was fucking the girl at this point, which he gleefully told me all the gory details of, despite my previous emotional attachment to her.

P was the type of character who never seemed to learn, or evolve past a certain state (gelatinous, I believe it was). His immaturity knew no bounds, as did his libido. Not only was he fucking his girlfriend, but also he was fucking X's roommate as well. He would move on to X soon after breaking up with his girl.

Not only did his immaturity and libido know no bounds, his hypocrisy was without borders as well. The girl he was dating was Christian. P supposedly converted from Satanism to Christianity just for her. Any outsider could have seen that his so-called conversion was an effective tool for getting inside of her.

X and I had been dating for a couple of months, when some tragedy befell one of her family members. She decided that she had to find God to help her through her problems. Being an agnostic I was, apparently, no help to her. P, being the ever-present born-again Christian was at her service. He did everything he could. He brought her to Bible studies. He brought her to Youth Group meetings. I went to one of these and was vilified for asking the "wrong" questions.

It got to the point where X would rarely talk to me. In the back of my mind I began to wonder whose girlfriend she really was. The silent tension between us eventually became so strong that we broke up.

One week prior to breaking up with X, P had broken up with his girlfriend. Two days after I was out of X's life, P began dating her. The realization of it was like hitting a brick wall. How could I have not seen? P's character indicated that he would do something like this. He was already fucking two girls at once - one of whom he fucked with the grace of the Lord behind him. Now, he and X were an item because he showed her back to religion. He had given her what she wanted and she was so grateful for it.

I was stunned. I felt betrayed. P was my "friend," was he not? Would a "friend" have done this to me? Would a "friend" worm his way into my relationship and then take someone I had cared for?

What of X? Did she even care at all if she was so willing to jump into someone else's arms so quickly after leaving mine? She knew what P was. She knew he was fucking her roommate, why was X suddenly enamored with P?

As far as any question in the paragraph before the last one, I had to answer, "no." The fact is that P was never a good friend in the first place. I only hung out with him, because I had been very lonely in middle school. By the time high school came around and then college, I found I no longer needed him anymore. He just never left.

As far as my questions about X, I have few answers. One word is constantly shoved to the forefront of my mind when I think of her however: incompatibility. We never should have been. If only I knew then...

I neither speak nor associate with X or P anymore. Lies and betrayal are among the worst things you can do to me. I decided such elements were not needed in my life, especially from people claiming to be my "friends." They don't understand why I was hurt or why I refuse to be associated with them. There are many things they don't understand.

The Definition Of Assault

In the spring semester of 1999, I added a third organization to my list of extracurricular activities. College Union Board (CUB) meetings now filled my schedule as well as the meetings for The Racquette (school newspaper) and WAIH (school radio station).

I really did not know what I was getting into when I joined CUB. All I knew is that I had to be a member of the organization in order to be employed. Had the job not been for the organization, I would have never joined.

In a nutshell, CUB's function was to organize and sponsor events for students on campus. This was the organization in charge of Springfest and Homecoming. It was CUB's responsibility to bring in bands and other forms of entertainment for these events. Being that CUB had the highest budget of any organization on campus, they were also expected to help other organizations out with funding for their events. Members of CUB voted on what happened with the money. The treasurer ultimately signed checks.

It was CUB's treasurer who I figuratively butted heads with. Like me, she too was a voting member. However, being that she was an executive part of the board, she had more power. It was not her power that upset me; it was her use of her power.

I felt that she was pursuing her own agenda, trying to get what she wanted, instead of what was best for the campus. I began to speak out against her. When I became an impediment to her power trip, she lashed out.

It started subtly. She would interrupt me in meetings. It became a little more obvious. I would get three or four voice mails about so-called "emergency" CUB meetings. Tensions began to mount as she and I silently tried to outdo the other. Soon, things became vicious.

Towards the end of the semester I received a very abrasive voice mail from CUB's treasurer telling me that I had not performed a function for my job not in my job description. It concluded by stating that my paycheck would be cut if I did not arrive in the CUB office to complete this task.

I went up to the office to find the door closed. I knocked and the treasurer opened the door. I told her that I did not appreciate the rude and condescending nature of her call.

At that point the shit hit the fan. All of her aggression exploded upon me and we both got into a vicious war of words. Where she got her ammunition from, I may never know, but at least I was truthful.

Among other things, she accused me of being:

• "...a fucking psycho."
• "...oh so good at those games."
• "...unable to take orders from a woman."

She eventually threatened to call the University Police if I didn't leave. I didn't stay to ask her on what basis, since she didn't have one. Decided that her screws were falling onto the floor, I left the room.

For the next few weeks, my life was turned upside down. The treasurer did in fact call the University Police. She also called all of CUB allies. Her story, however, was not that we got into an argument. She painted a portrait of me as a crazed lunatic, who broke down the door, beat the shit out of her and then left. How she got this story out of being called "rude and condescending," I have no idea. All I knew is that people believed her, and that was very bad for me. The worst part was coming back to my residence hall after hearing that she had in fact screwed me royally to a rather large CUB member saying, "stay away from her or else!"

It was a friend of mine who convinced me that I should go down to the University Police on my own accord to inquire about the complaint lodged against me. I did, and found out what she had actually said about me. Basically, she had blown everything way out of proportion to make me appear decidedly demonic.

The rumor mill as this point was churning things out on overdrive (in no small part thanks to her). It was rumored that she wanted me banned from playing at Hurley's for playing a song about killing her (I never played such a song). It was rumored that she wanted to oust me from CUB. I heard tales of all sorts, both true and untrue, but mostly somewhere in-between. It was hell on Earth.

The situation was finally resolved after many more trips to the University Police office, a talk with my lawyer (who said that charge would have been thrown out in the real world, due to a clerical error) and a discussion with an administrative official. It was decided that there would be a mediation session between CUB's treasurer and myself, provided she agreed to it. If she didn't agree, nothing would happen to me.

Nothing happened.

This incident only served to reinforce my belief that a liar and a power tripper are a very dangerous thing. At the same time, it was the truth that saved me. While her story had begun to crumble even before it's 20th telling, mine remained static.

It was not as if I was very fond of this person to begin with. Having her try to put me under in this way is a blow to the head. When people tell me I should just get over it, I find it hard to take them seriously. Basically, she turned my life inside out. She violated me with lies. She tried to ruin me. These things are not easy to "get over." You go through it sometime and you'll see. The ironic thing is that she now tells everyone that she is "over" it. What did she ever have to get over? Did she have to recover from an ego bruised by being called, "rude and condescending?" Effectively she had nothing to get over. My wounds were real. Recovery isn't easy.

Go Forth Softly

Overall, my first year at college was not a horrific ordeal. Like the rest of life, it had its ups and downs. Life is evolution and those who don't evolve tend to die. By the end of my first year I had learned so much, but had yet to learn so much. I was reserved to one fact though: my life had become very strange, and it was only going to get stranger...