New Thoughts, New Roommates

Much like the weather in Minnesota, my living situation has changed, again.

After a long day of stifling heat, now it’s raining, our house is cooling off, and the perks of a female-dominated home are really coming to fruition.

Our new roommate Tina moved in last week, and the house is clean. It smells good. The TV is off, and Tina and her boyfriend just opened a bottle of wine. Tina and I are chillin’, Sanna is probably reliving her day at work where she served coffee and a turkey sandwich to THE Josh Harnett. (Apparently, he is even cuter in real life. Swoon!) The boys are just chatting about the good ol’ days of playing Halo in college. And now there is talk of playing Scrabble.

This is nothing like living with boys. Again, I want to reiterate my preference of living with boys, but nights like this really give the male species a run for their money. I can’t remember the last time any of my roommates were all in the same room, talking, no TV, playing some nice, wholesome board games.

Something keeps tugging at me though. The TV remote? Facebook? The desire to perform senseless acts of push-ups? I don’t know, but it’s almost a little alarming at how quiet and peaceful our house is right now. I’m used to the sounds of ESPN, or arguing about politics, or just general noise. So now that everything is as I used to believe it should be, it strikes me as odd that I’m so distracted by the sheer newness of it all. Also, the boys talking about Halo makes me want to play Halo. And that, my friends, is something I just don’t typically do.

There’s no competition around me. There’s no testosterone brimming at the edge of every comment. I have a feeling that if I wanted to, I could talk about my feelings, and people just might listen. Is it wrong that I feel a little out of place?

But then again, maybe being around all that masculinity has tamed my feminine prowess to the point of non-existence. But I have a dress on right now, people. And I like it. Sure I’m sipping a cold beer, but I’m doing it with jewelry on. I don’t know, I think this is a good thing. I think I need to regain some feminine skills, like communication and compassion. And showering.

And just now I realized that this might just work after all. Sanna turned on the TV, the Scrabble game seems to be getting quite tense, and I’m sitting in front of the fan while the wind blows up my dress without a care in the world. If men are from Mars, and women are from Venus, I do believe I may have found Earth. (Plus, neither Tina nor Geo had any problem telling me how dumb that last line was, and it felt good.)