Living off Campus is a completely new ball game from freshman and sophomore year. You quickly become flooded with all of these responsibilities that you didn’t know existed before. Despite all of the adulting you have to do, there are a few pros to living off campus. One of the first pros is…
Having Your Car
Now that you live off campus your parents really have no other excuse to not letting you bring your car to school. Getting to finally have your car on campus is the most relieving thing on earth because you no longer have to base your life on the unpredictable shuttles and you can have all off the late night main street creamery runs that you want without the lack of Uber’s hold you back. Though with every pro comes a con and one of the con’s of having your car is well… having your car. Now that you and all your friends have cars at school, someone has to be the one that picks everyone up from the night out. Though being the mom does have its perks (like free food) it is slightly annoying when you’re all ready for bed then you realize that your friends need to be picked up. But in the end they’re your friends so it’s not that bad and is usually a pretty funny time. Going along with having your car at school, the next con is going to class.
Going to Class
So long to the days where you could roll out of your bed at 7:50 for your 8am and make it there with 5 minutes to spare. For myself, I need to leave at least 20 minutes before my class so I can find parking. 9 times out of 10 you wont find parking because that sh*t is the hunger games all over again. Then in the event that you DO find parking you most likely made an enemy getting that parking spot and still have to run across campus to get to your class. Though on the plus side of going to class, you no longer have to succumb to the watered down Outtakes coffee. You’re now blessed with the ability to get Dunkin before classes, which in itself makes up for the whole parking situation. Now that your off campus and live in your own house there are some pretty sweet perks of it.
Having your own House
Showing all your friends your newly decorated and furnished house feels like your own real life episode of MTV cribs. You have now been blessed with your own full kitchen, bedrooms without concrete walls, and bathroom showers with places to put your leg when you shave them. You no longer have to deal with RA’s randomly coming into your suite or public safety knocking on your door because your music is too loud, you have complete and absolute control. On the contrary, houses only can have 5 people in it so a con is that you have to drive to your some of your friends houses. Nothing is worse than wanting to see your friends and have a movie night with cookies but you have to drive 10 minutes to do so. You no longer have the luxury of being able to walk down the hall to their room and watch a movie right there. Lastly, you also no longer have the luxury of walking 1 minute to unlimited food, you have to grocery shop.
Grocery Shopping
There are two sides to this equation, on the bright side you no longer have to deal with 63s average food because you can just make whatever you want whenever you want. But on the downside you now have to make your own meals every time you want to eat. Something that quickly will become your best friend is meal prepping. This is when you cook all the food you will eat for the week Sunday night and then separate it into containers. It only sucks for the 2 hours that you cook on Sunday night but then you have food set for the week. The other downside of Grocery Shopping is how much money you spend. You no longer end of getting the nice bread and deli meats that your parents get, because your grocery bill will end of being $200. Sometimes you have to pick your battles when you go into the grocery store, I will usually get the nice deli cut cheese but then I’ll cheap out and get the store brand english muffins. you win some you loose some.
Despite whether you live on campus or whether you live off campus you will make amazing memories either way. Don’t let where you live dictate your feelings towards college because you only get 4 years and you better make the best of them. In the end its just a place to sleep so don’t stress about it too much, embrace it.