Floor Nine

So here's what's going down on floor 9 of Aber Hall:

At the start of the school year, our neighbors kindly invited us over for some birthday cake and some quality sing-a-long jamming on their guitar. It all seemed pretty jolly and ho-hum, the kind of thing you anticipate when you go to college. A spontaneous birthday party on your dorm floor, meeting tons of new people, singing Matt Nathanson...what could go wrong?!?

And then it started. Now, personally, I don't care if you smoke or drink or what you decide to do in your free time. It's your choice and while I wouldn't necessarily make the same decisions, if it doesn't affect me directly, who am I to say anything? One night in the middle of a Chemistry crisis, I smelled it. And...ten minutes later, my head started to ache. And then the yelling and music started. And for the next three hours, our room absolutely reeked and people in the hallways started knocking on our door to see where the smoke was coming from. Nope, not us. Just our neighbors smoking pot and stinking up both our room and the hall way. That's when it did start to affect me and when all of us started to get a wee bit annoyed.

Luckily, it didn't happen again for another month. And then it did, again, in the middle of a Chemistry crisis at my desk. It was an ugh moment but we let it pass again without notice. By this point, it was mid-November and there was only a month left in the semester so no one really cared enough to do anything. The next time, it was only 2 weeks later. And then twice more before the semester over. And, the worst night of all, the night before my Chemistry final. Now, we started to really get annoyed. I mean, really!?!? In our dorm? How could they not know that you could smell it from the other end of the hallway? How could you not think that our RA could catch them in a second? 

Semester finally ended and my roommate and I and everyone on floor 9 forgot about our neighbors and their illicit activities in our dorm. After 5 weeks, we came back to semester and were nothing but smiles. It didn't take long for our neighbors to return to their old regime, however, and soon enough, it became once a day. And then....two times a day. And, as it got worse, so did their attitudes. Their sleeping schedules got messy and they started yelling at us to be quiet at 3PM...in the afternoon. And then staying up all night playing music. One day, we noticed a piece of paper next to their door in the hallway where the window at the end of the hall was located. People sometimes talk on the phone there because it's at the end of the hallway and a convenient place to  talk without disrupting the whole dorm. 

The sign said, "This is not a place to talk on the phone, please don't. -room 958." Our entire floor was pissed, I mean, where else do we have the option of going to talk on the phone for two minutes at night when our roommates are sleeping? And besides, did they ever respect any of us!? So, my friend Maggie taped another piece of paper right next to the other sign saying, "This is not a place to smoke your pot, please don't. -floor 9." Maybe not the most mature way to handle things, but after hearing a slew of obscenities and the ripping of paper when they discovered it, it stopped completely and once again floor 9 was drama free!

And then, again, things got worse. I guess we should have predicted this, fight fire with fire, and the whole floor would burn. Slowly, they started writing comments on our door white-board. And then unplugging our Christmas lights multiple times a day. And then unscrewing the lightbulbs. We only know that it was them because one of the other floor 9 gals saw them do it and told our RA. Finally, two days ago, my roommate woke up at the usual 7AM to shower. She walked outside her door to discover her shower caddy...gone. Gone. Literally, gone. Now, I guess we don't technically know who did it. But considering our neighbors across from us and next to us moved out and every other shower caddy was there perfectly intact, we have our fair guess. Together, we banged on their door and asked if they knew where it was. Our neighbor looked at us, smiled and laughed sarcastically, and said, "Why would we do that?" And slammed the door in our face. Huh.

So that's where we're at now. Missing shower caddies. Awkward passings in the hallway. Watching them and all their friends look up when we enter the cafeteria. And, even if it's not them, who would honestly be stupid enough to steal a used razor, shampoo and conditioner, a body sponge, face wash, body wash, and awkward items that only belong to their rightful users in the shower? Like, honestly. The last thing I would want to do out of revenge is take something that has been where God only knows in the shower. It's laughable. It's hilarious. It's down right weird. My only guess as to who might be dumb enough to do this: people who will smoke pot in their dorm room with their door open when the RA is home. 

Truth be known, we'll probably never solve the mystery. And we'll never get along with our neighbors. But, I'll miss floor 9 in three weeks when the semester ends and I can't wait to laugh about the mystery of the missing shower caddy for years to come.