The entire act of going to college is so full of built-in stress that it’s hard to comprehend how all college students don’t have ulcers and panic disorders (and some or most of them do.) Between the $60,000 in student loan debt, holding down a decent job, making friends, and lining up potential careers, it’s amazing how we can wake up for class every morning.
I’ve met so many students who say they have anxiety attacks or panic attacks and have to leave class sometimes just to have a breakdown in a bathroom stall. The school counselors and psychiatrists are overrun with people who are already burned out at 22. This is unacceptable.
Type A personalities (otherwise known as the competitive, intense, heart-attacks-waiting-to-happen) have it the worst of all.
Courtesy: Google Images
Being a Type B personality, I have only my intuition and experience (which are lacking) to use in order to understand these high-strung people. My room mate just happens to be one.
I swear we should be on “The Odd Couple.”
When she stresses out, I’m cool as a cucumber. When we both have tons of homework, she’s frantically trying to finish it all and I leisurely flip the pages of my Anthropology text and take frequent breaks to munch on tasty treats. You should have seen us both on finals week: I was heavily involved in a caffeine-induced hallucination about riding a pink unicorn, and she was tearfully attempting to cram for her cumulative final. I’m talking to you, VH1, we need a reality show!
Stay tuned, Boys, Girls, and Everything in between, our next installment will include easy ways to de-stress and healthily relieve those pesky stress-ies!
Your dorm will never look this nice.
So, as I’ve been preparing for college, I’ve realized that it isn’t what it seems. Those things that you always took for granted, you’ll now realize are a lifeline and a godsend.
Things run very smoothly in my house. If you needed juice, you could get it in the pantry. Milk? It’s right there! Toilet paper? Check the basement…that’s where the Y2K storage had blossomed into a wonderful array of canned goods and essential toiletries.
Sadly, when you’re crammed into a ten by eleven with two other people and no bathroom, there is no magical supply of necessity items to keep you from killing your neighbor for her supplies.
So, as many of us soon-to-be college kids have done, I will compile a list of those great godsends that keep that dorm machine running as smoothly as…possible.
1. Paper or Dish towels
Regardless of your habits, there’s no doubting that you WILL need paper towels at some point in your life. They double as plates and can keep your Chef Boyardee from making the inside of the microwave into a meaty Jackson Pollock. And when you’re done you can use the roll for fencing matches or use your imagination. Just remember to recycle!
2. Petroleum Jelly (aka Vaseline) or Antibiotic ointment (aka Neosporin)
I know it sounds awkward, but ointments (especially the antibiotic ones) are very important to have. Not only are they great for helping to heal cuts and scrapes, they also work for chapped lips and dry, cracked skin. Just make sure to invest in a generic brand (if it’s cheaper.)
3. Shower shoes
In college, being squeaky clean takes a back seat to sleep or nourishment. But while you’re in there you’re in that phone booth they call a shower, you’ll need some protection for your little piggies. Athlete’s foot and fungus run rampant in warm dry climates like a shower stall. You’ll really be grateful for a thick flip-flop between you and that germ-soaked tile floor.
4. Hand Sanitizer
There’s nothing worse than having to take a mid-term with a fever of 102. Somehow professors always seem to schedule and exam for the day that you come down with a nasty cold. So, stop those colds before they start by using hand sanitizer frequently. 
5. Febreeze or Room Spray
Now I have good hygiene. I am not a dirty person by any means; however, I have found that when two people are crammed into a closet, things get smelly. No matter how much deodorant you use, the room will often begin to reek of armpit and your suitemate’s overcooked Ramen noodles. Invest in something that doesn’t smell like the inside of a gym shoe.
This is only a preview of the laundry list of items that are necessary for survival in the college wilderness. I hope you enjoy and will learn something from the fruits of my -ahem- numerous misfortunes during my first semester in college.
Happy Dorm-ing!
…all my classes are there anyway. What more do I need?
About 10 months ago a began my application to college. I submitted it a full month before the due date in mid-February. They were a month late in getting me my acceptance letter. That was strike number one.
Two months ago I submitted my Health Record but neglected to fill in the date of my last tetanus shot. After many failed attempts at communication, the THIRD fax finally took and they “received my vaccination records.” Thank you.
That was strike two.
About 3 months ago I applied for housing as soon as I could. And they were nearly three weeks late on getting me a dorm assignment. I finally got it TODAY, and because they only give you the first three letters of your Residence Hall, there are now two possibilities of what building I’ll be in. And the phone lines are all busy.
Maybe I should give them four strikes.
Filed under: Public School, School, Uncategorized | Tags: ADD, frustration, lessons, life, Public School, ranting, society
I have lived in the same small town for 19 years. I was born here and went from preschool on up to even my first year of college.
I’ll give small towns credit, they do bring people together into a very close-knit “family” of sorts, but living in a veritable social bubble did not prepare me for being a grown up. As I get closer and closer to college, I realize that I’m lacking in so much essential information about lots of things. This is mostly because I went to public school in a school system that focuses on testing rather than learning…and there are many things I wish I had learned.
Public school didn’t teach me to play outside. Recess ended at 6th grade (earlier for some), but the outdoors are crucial to a child’s development long after they shut you in and put you in front of a whiteboard. No wonder so many kids are being misdiagnosed as having ADD or ADHD…they’re anxious to get outside and run around!!
Public school didn’t teach me the darker side of things. There was always a clear definition of right and wrong, but there were times when I knew that the books were biased for or against a certain side. Yes, southerners during the Civil War were slave owners , but President Lincoln wasn’t a hero on a white stallion. Lincoln never even opposed slavery to keep up his approval rating…a true politician. I am now finding out the truth behind many events I thought were set in stone…and it’s an odd feeling.
Public school didn’t teach me to write in cursive. My mother always bragged about her days in Catholic School. The nuns were sticklers for penmenship and my mother, being left handed, was one of the best in her class. I have good handwriting; it’s no John Handcock, but it’s very neat. However, I can’t say the same for most of my classmates. Teachers have become more handwriting interpreters and have turned to Scantron tests to avoid having to read shoddy handwriting. Is that an “A” or a “Q”? I can’t tell.
Public school didn’t teach me that there are other people out there that are different than me. In a town composed of the Caucasian (I hate that word) middle-class, I never really got to experience different culture. I’ve been interested in different culture–small town hasn’t turned me into a bigot–but exposure would have been nice.
Public school didn’t teach me to protest and to change the way my world is. It more taught me how to just accept the way things were because I didn’t know any different. Honestly, it wasn’t all that bad…I just wish that now I had more of a fighting spirit like my hippie parents.
But mostly, public school didn’t teach me anything about Life! I’m leaving for college in a week and I don’t know what to expect. I’m surprised I even know how to write a check or put gas in my car. I can’t believe that I know the quadratic formula but I don’t know how to pay bills or build good credit. I’m being thrown (somewhat) into a “sink-or-swim” situation I have no flotation device. Sure, public school is a wonderful invention that enables every child to get a good education…I’m not doubting that. I just think it should be an option to take a class in practical, real life situations–one that doesn’t teach you to make a great souffle.
So, thank you Public School, for preparing me academically for the real world. I’ll be able to recite all 50 states and find the hypotenuse side of a right triangle, but don’t expect me to understand why I’m $10,000 in debt and don’t expect me to sew on your button.
