Part 1: Arrival
At 18 years old my parents helped me load up my Grandparents’ old Buick and make the trek 9 hours east to college in Tennessee. I attended a private christian school with about 2,000 undergrad students. There were 2-3 girls for every guy, and instead of fraternities or sororities we had co-ed social clubs. I attended with two of my dearest friends from high school and church. We lived in a suite connected by a bathroom on the third floor of our building.
There was a girls side of campus and a boys side. No one of the opposite sex was allowed anywhere past the lobby of the dorms. (Except for Halloween when we had chaperoned trick or treating.) We each had dorm parents, or dorm moms, and there was a strict curfew.
My original roommate broke her leg and needed to stay on the ground floor, so I ended up rooming with a girl who we’ll call T. T was friendly enough, but we did not last as roomies. I was so homesick I cried every day for a month. She thought I was ridiculous and would ask my how come I was still homesick? (Her family lived 45 minutes away. I was 2 states away from MY family.)
Finally she moved out to live with her other friends, before eventually dropping out of school. (Maybe T was the smart one…) Anyway, after she moved we found jewelry and other items behind her bed. She had been stealing from us and we didn’t realize it.
Thankfully I had the rest of the school year with a single room.
They made us participate in a humiliation ritual called “Interface” where we had to hang out with a specific group of people for the week. I did make one close friend, but it wasn’t until after interface when we started hanging out. My interface leader was a character. He was a senior when I was a freshman, and by the time I graduated as a senior he was still working at the college in admissions. (You know the type… Clinging to youth. Peaked in college. Dating all the incoming freshman hunting for the right Christian girl to settle down with… Those poor unsuspecting freshmen…)
At interface I also met the guy I would pine for all freshman/sophomore year. But that’s a story for another time.
Redheaded Jill 
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