After IV
BONUS: Nicole Carline & More Roommate Stories

Musical Interlude

Interview

Nicole Carline  0:09  
Can I tell you and experience with my sister? 

Jon Steele
Yeah, go ahead. 

Nicole Carline
When we lived together. We’d do things like that. Very passive aggressive. My family can be very blunt with each other but we can also be extremely indirect communicators. And we were living together anytime we fought my mom would come over every now and then and she always knew we were fighting because she would go in the kitchen and the sink would be full of this is Oh, nice If there was a fight we'd be like "Well, then you can do the dishes." Like usually we would take turns. We were fighting we would see who would break. 

Jon Steele
Oh, yeah, totally. 

Nicole Carline
Inevitably. My mom would come over before we finished our fighting or somebody broke and she would do the dishes. So we just started that whole thing all over.

Jon Steele  1:00  
Yeah, I had... So this was in college with people that I knew really well. One of our roommates would never do the dishes and we had like communal kitchen downstairs. We would all do our dishes he wouldn't. And we even tested this like just to make sure we were like okay, we are not going to use any dishes, just to make sure that like we know who's doing this and they continue to pile up like to the point that there was actually mold in the sink from these dirty dishes. So each one of us took one set of dishes, you know, a plate, a bowl and silverware and a cup. We washed them up and we took them to our rooms and we and then we all had our own kind of ensuite bathrooms in this townhouse where we were living and we so we would use it and we would go into our own bathroom we would wash it up and then come back out. One day once all the dishes were actually done. We found him in there washing them. He ran out of dish soap and was using hand sanitizer to clean his dishes. Needless to say we never used another one of those dishes again and continued to only use our own that we had set aside. I mean, I don't have any memory of it ending so it may have been the rest of our college career. Oh, yeah, it was it was ridiculous. So but you know, we would also go down and steal his toilet paper. So because he would hoard toilet paper. So we would go down and he would just have piles of it. Because if you you could get free toilet paper from the university but you had to go to like the front desk and where you would check in and out and stuff like that. And you had to actually get because we lived in a townhouse that was owned by the university. So still campus housing, we had an RA and all that kind of stuff. Actually he was our RA which makes it even better. Go to the desk and they would ration out toilet paper to you. He had to work at the desk. So he would just take armloads and put it under his under his in his bathroom so that he would never run out. We would go downstairs and steal his toilet paper so that we didn't have to go to the front desk and get it. Nicole any other any other as you put it for your situation like sort of silly roommate stories, things that you would do differently. if you had the opportunity? 

Nicole Carline  3:18  
Now, this was probably more my fault. So I have a problem with nesting. So and I like that was I don't know. Anyway, when I get comfortable in my space I start like I'll pick a corner I'll pick a chair or something like that in the living room or wherever I am throughout the day. And throughout time things start piling up books, musical instruments, roller skates, whatever I ended up doing in that chair. I never for some reason I just can't put things away. Maybe this is that like when it's out of sight. It's out of mind for me and I forget that I wanted to do something so I leave it visible. So I remember but then I still don't do it because it gets piled into things right so anyway, I was living so back to my very first roommate Katie, who is my best, very best friend now. Katie is a saint. The things that she put up with me is it's a miracle. We are the best friends that we are and it's an a testament to her sainthood. One of the things that I would do is I would have these piles in the living room. Right this is our communal space and I was away. And Katie was a very neat and tidy person. And so I came home one day and all my stuff was gone. I was like Hey, where's all my stuff? And she goes well I was working on this project. And I needed space and everything like the whole table was covered. There was all this stuff in the way so I hope you don't mind but I got a box. I put all of your things in a box. I tried to keep it together. And I said it in your bedroom next to your desk. And I was like that's acceptable. Okay, I'm sorry. I'm sorry. I'm this way. I'm sorry. But I wish it truthfully I wish I was a better roommate. To my really like similar to you. I probably could have made the communal space for Laura a lot more hospitable and welcoming to her. I think I we had the very same experiences of them coming in after we've already settled with Katie I'm like I wish she probably would never even say this but i just i wish i i would get out of my head a little bit more and be more mindful about the communal space for her sake and allowing her to like equally have the space and not just all my stuff all over the place.

Jon Steele  6:21  
Yep, absolutely. And that makes it makes me feel like you know one of the things that this you know this goes back to your your Laura story as well. That you know, one of the things I think that we have to identify with roommates is sort of the different levels of cleanliness even that we that we expand of our space because what I consider clean somebody else might consider very dirty, like or very disorganized or whatever. And so sort of that like setting up in a corner, which might make a space feel homey and the things that I spend most of my time doing or interacting with are just right here within reach like that feels very practical. And but for other people it's like it's so cluttered in here. Like I can't move around the way that I need to and and that can go with just like the stuff that you leave out but also like how often do you clean your apartment like actual like cleaning the bathroom, cleaning the sink, cleaning out leftover food in the refrigerator and those kinds of things like having a list of house rules for what's expected for levels of cleanliness and maybe being able being willing to to make some make some moves towards the middle with one another. Like it doesn't have to be as clean as I would like it to be. Or I can do a better job of being a little bit cleaner than what I'm used to or a little tidier. I don't want to say clean isn't like as if we're like clean and dirty people but maybe a little tidier than what I'm used to. Yeah that would have been really helpful for my roommate situation for us to establish that. And it sounds like that's been fairly similar experiences for you as well. There's another one that comes to my mind with the same with the same person and that was one time I got locked out of our apartment. And I remember I remember that he was not that he consistently did not lock the deadbolt on the house like on the apartment I would be the one that was doing it. Well one day I left and forgot my keys. And I don't remember how long I was gone but by the time I came back the deadbolt was locked the door closed deadbolt locked and I could not get in and I called him you know, we had phones I called him and calls him and called him and texted him did not hear back from him. I had one of those moments where I'm standing outside of my own apartment deciding which one of the cards in my wallet am I going to use to try to key my card my way into my apartment and I couldn't do it. I couldn't get in. So I had to go. I think it was spend the night with another friend because I couldn't get into my own apartment. And whether he was ignoring me or actually was asleep and his phone was on silent. I don't know. But this this is my very practical takeaway from this is we now live in an age where our phones have like Do Not Disturb but the emergency contact list. If you are somebody who turns on Do Not Disturb at night. Make sure all of your roommates are on your emergency contact list so that they can still break through that do not disturb in case they get locked out or something else happens to them. That's I would do that very differently. Now if that was a situation.

Nicole Carline  9:20  
That is really good advice. Very good advice. 

Jon Steele  9:22  
It would have come in handy for sure for sure.

Podcast Outro – (Upbeat acoustic guitar music)

Hey, thanks so much for joining us today, Alumni. If there was anything that you learned, really enjoyed, or that encouraged you from today's episode, would you send us a DM or tag us in a story? We'd love to hear about it. You can find us @afterivpod on Instagram and Facebook. And if you haven't already, take just a second to unlock your phone and subscribe to the podcast. If your platform lets you, leave us a rating and a review. And if you like what we're doing here, share us with your InterVarsity or other post-graduation friends. Thanks again for listening. And I will see you in the after, Alumni.

Transcribed by https://otter.ai