Young Adventures: Away From Home

I made it. They left me. There I was - 18 years old, college freshman, no school for the next 8 months, working for The Mouse. I don’t think I knew what to do with myself at the time. So much freedom and such an introvert.

I had five other roommates. Two I can remember distinctly.

One felt that she resembled Jasmine from Aladdin, singer, ditsy, glamor girl, always concerned about her weight (she was the size of a thick twig). The other was another tiny one, blonde to the core, learning her way, had never been away from home, and apparently wasn’t taught much. I recall one time that she baked a pizza on a plastic cutting board - she said she didn’t know that it would melt.

I was showering one day and then I hear a loud banging that seemed too close for comfort. I got out of the shower and dressed. Surely they would have notified us of some sort of construction happening in or around the building. I walk out of my room and there is my roommate, in the living room on the floor with one of the oven racks, the white cutting board melted to the rack, and a hammer in hand attempting to separate the two. After she told me what happened, I gathered my things and walked out. I couldn’t believe that it made sense in her mind to put plastic in the oven.