On the Sunny Side of the Street

I'm sure that you can only imagine what dorm living is like for someone who has not lived in a dorm since her freshman year. Let's just be polite and say that it was quite some time ago. In fact, dinosaurs still freely roamed the earth at that point in time and there was only black and white TV. We used to listen to music on these plastic discs that you scratched with a needle. There were no cell phones, no internet, no laptops, no FACEBOOK!!! How did we EVER survive?

I can remember doing a project for a class when I was still an engineering major where we had to determine a future animal population using BASIC and punchcards. We then had to take the cards to the computer room, which incidentally was not a room full of computers, but a room with ONE computer which took up all available space. The grad assistant on duty would feed your cards into the computer and you would wait for 15 minutes for the answer - 1415 antelope. Or whatever.

Flash forward to today. I am living in a studentenheim (translate: student house) with people my daughters' ages. It has taken some adjustment. It's a bit like Mr. Toad's Wild Ride. I routinely come home to halls filled with blue smoke from either burned dinners or cigarettes. (Smoking is rampant here in Europe.) One day I was down in the basement jockeying for position for one of the washing machines and I found a confused freshman standing in front of the machine. She had never done her own laundry, confessing that "My mother always does it for me." To which I said, "And she still does!" as I sorted her clothes, set the machine, and let it rip.

One of the students on the floor below must have received a new sound system for Christmas and decided that everyone needed a demonstration of its inherent power. I'm all for showing off your new and fabulous stereo, but not between 1 and 3 in the morning. Never one to hold back, I went downstairs and told them in no uncertain terms that it was irritating.

My immediate neighbor is a nice guy from India named Sunny. I'm not sure that's his given name, but I must say that it's an appropriate nickname. He really has a sunny disposition. Sunny is kind and generous. He also has one of the most resonant voices imaginable. He likes to play virtual football (soccer) and will vociferously encourage or disparage his avatar at all hours. He talks on the phone at a high volume. The best is when he sings. He'll play something on the radio or computer that sounds like "Benny Lava" and sing along. 

I must confess that at first I found all of this to be immensely irritating, but after a while I realized that these are all happy sounds and I find it weirdly reassuring to hear Sunny sing in the morning. It means that all is well in the world!