Tanya Tucker, Fruit Brutes, backrubs

College student finds bigger world in dorm

At a recent meeting of the Northwest Arkansas Community College board of trustees meeting, there was a discussion of adding dormitories. Todd Schwartz, board vice chairman, said parents he talks to say a lack of dorms is the No. 1 reason they exclude the community college for their teens. “They want the dorm experience,” Schwartz said. Field trips to Kansas and Missouri have been lined up in the coming weeks to visit other community colleges that now offer the “dorm experience.”

As an individual who himself attended a community college for two years before going on to attend a state university, I feel especially entitled to weigh in with my own anecdotal evidence on this topic.

After attending my local community college for two years in Ocala, Fla., that fall, at the fresh age of 19 years old, I went to a new students’ orientation weekend at Florida State University. The weekend included a one-night stay at one of the dorms to help prospective students know what to expect. That evening, I was paired with an international student from China, who introduced himself as Ping, but otherwise seemed to speak no English. The next morning, I awoke slowly with the sensation of a gentle back rub. After a few moments, I realized it was not a dream, but Ping had slipped into my bed and was giving the unauthorized sauna treatment. Perhaps he was seeking consolations from the potential hostile and unknown environment that awaited us both, but I must admit, I left before finding out his actual intentions. Welcome to the university.

Two weeks later, minus Ping, I checked into my first dorm room on campus. It was a small room with two bunk beds, two small desks and a sink by the door. There was a hall bathroom that served the entire sixth floor. Soon my roommate arrived, wearing flip-flops with green hospital scrub pants and top. He said that his name was Lonnie and he came from a small town called Raiford,

College for me was the only time in which being poor and drunk was acceptable. —Anonymous Fayetteville attorney

where the big prison was. “I want to be a guard there and marry Tanya Tucker,” he told me with a twisted grin.

My first morning, I awoke to Lonnie using our small sink to relieve himself, saying he couldn’t wait long enough to go down the hall. “Don’t worry, I’ll wash it out with water” — again, with that grin that would soon haunt me. Over the weeks, I learned the lyrics in my sleep to the Tanya Tucker song “Delta Dawn,” which he played at least four times every day on his cassette player. His diet consisted of mainly of Fruit Brute cereal (a Lucky Charms competitor), which featured some sort of demented wolf on the box that slowly in my mind came to resemble Lonnie. He never seemed to go to class, telling me they bored him. I assumed someone in his family worked at a hospital as he seemed to have an endless supply of worn scrub clothing he would wear once the older clothing got unbearable. Unfortunately, my attempts to “de-sink train” him were dismal failures, with him always saying, “It’s just water anyway,” as his reasoning.

Then suddenly, one Friday in October, Lonnie was gone. My dorm manager knocked on my door to tell me Lonnie had been expelled and I would have no room-mate for the rest of the semester.

Dorm life for me was important. I became dorm ping-pong champion. My social life, once word spread I had a private room, accelerated beyond all dreams. I learned how to eat out of the same pot I cooked in, and oh yes, I learned how to sanitize a bedroom sink. Prior to dorm life, I had lived only at home and lacked any real awareness of interacting with strangers in such a personal way. I was indebted to Lonnie and Ping for giving me precious real-life social experiences that helped me learn the world was much bigger than I realized — and how to get along with it. My next roommate became a lifelong friend.

So NWACC, go forth boldly and build those dorms! Just make sure that the sinks aren’t installed too high.