Roommates should respect each other's space, time and possessions

By Sarah West

December 22, 2005 | We always thought part of the college experience would be the awesome roommates that we get to live with, who we'd have late night parties and therapy sessions with. And it is part of the experience, but it's usually not a good one, because of their lack of respect for the rest of the roommates.

Respect is a major shortage in today's society, including college. It's such a basic thing, it's surprising how many people don't know what it is. "Courteous regard for people's feelings" is one dictionary definition of respect. We've heard a lot of roommate horror stories, but we've had our fair share of experiences too.

Here are a few instances when we, as roommates, haven't been given respect. It's an unwritten rule that when you live with other people you don't spend two straight hours in the bathroom. Instead, you shower and then get ready in your room. But not our current roommates. They insist on showering, blow-drying their hair, straightening or curling it and doing their make-up all in the bathroom. This has often prevented us from showering, and has forced us to wear hats.

Another rule that these roommates apparently don't know or care about is leaving their laundry in the washer and dryer. When we need to wash our clothes, there are many times when we can't because their clothes are still in the washer or the dryer. We check for the next few days, but we guess they still have plenty of clean clothes, because they aren't taken out for another three days or so. Do they think we enjoy not having any clean clothes to wear?

But there is one roommate experience that is a legacy that will live on forever. My best friend (a good roommate) and I had purchased a painting of a puppy with long ears and bright blue eyes, in a gold frame from the local Deseret Industries. It wasn't the prettiest thing, but we liked it. So we placed it in the living room on OUR little desk in the corner. The next morning we woke up to the picture face down on the floor. We thought it had just gotten knocked over on accident, so we picked it up and put it back. However, the next morning, we again found the puppy picture face down on the floor. This is when we began to get suspicious. This continued for the entire year, waking up to it on the floor. And every morning we would pick it back up and put it in its proper place. It was a silent war we had with our other two, obviously puppy-biased, roommates. One of these roommates had a picture hung on the wall that her dad had painted. We thought about taking it off the wall one day and putting it face down on the floor, but we decided not to because, unlike them, we actually had the respect to not touch their belongings.

Roommates, listen up, and remember the other people that you live with. If you want respect, you've got to give it too.

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MS