A Rough Start

     They say the first week of school is usually the hardest: unfamiliar subjects, new teachers, classmates you don't yet know. And while I'd usually be fine with a normally rough week, my first week this semester was absolutely miserable- but not because of classes. As I sat at my desk on Tuesday morning, filling out a few job applications since I woke up earlier than I needed to for my class, my computer screen went dark. My fan's gentle humming slowed to a stop, and before I could blink, the lights went out, consuming me in the quiet dark.

    The power was out. And being a naive and hopeful newcomer to the world of renting an apartment, I thought it was just a fluke that would be fixed within the hour, maybe by the time of lunch if I was unlucky. As the air began to warm up, I decided I'd rather go out and get breakfast than wait for the power to come back on. So out I went, and after breakfast, went to class. But when I returned, as soon as I opened the door there was an oppressive, humid wall of air that hit me like a sack of bricks. Somehow, not only was the power still out, but the climate within my apartment was worse than outside. Still naive, I simply asked my roommate, whom I will call "Andrew" for this blog, to call the apartment office, since we thought he was the utilities account holder for our apartment. But the problem lay deeper still.

    I didn't think much of it, so I went to go get lunch and meet with friends. Over lunch, Andrew texted our groupchat, asking if anyone had made an account for utilities. Confused, we said that we thought he had the account. He did not. To make a long story short, apparently he and his old roommates (who used to live in the apartment we live in now) didn't pay their utility bill before moving out (among many other things they forgot to do before moving out). This led to the City of Tallahassee cutting our power because of a previous tenant's mistakes, which is very frustrating, since we were being punished for doing nothing wrong.

The dirtier alternative

    As the sun dipped lower and lower into the sky, it was clear we needed to find somewhere to spend the night. Wade crashed at another film student's apartment, my other roommate spent the night in his office, and I was left to find somewhere to sleep for the night. While dirtier, funnier alternatives were considered, I ended up crashing at a friend's house, and everyone there was very understanding and supportive over what we were going through. 

The next day, however, came and went with no power. After relentlessly pestering Andrew for an update on the power, he said he couldn't do anything because he never had an account to begin with, meaning we had to reach out to his old roommate "Patrick" for access to the account, in order to pay a bill that was overdue for a month. Hours passed, but we finally got a hold of Patrick, had him open his account, and then realized that we needed all of the old roommates to pay their end of the bill. But the catch was that the last roommate needed hadn't been seen or heard from in months... 

    Those days, I had come to hate how slow the days would pass. I alternated between walking to class, stopping by my apartment to shower (in the DARK!!!) in freezing water, and barely spending over 15 minutes per visit, since the apartment had temperatures of 102 degrees somehow. I would spend hours at the library reading papers, writing essays, and filling out all first-week surveys for my classes. They were long and lonely days... but my anger at the morons who messed up my power kept me going- if they weren't going to solve it, I would.

    So as soon as I could, we found the last guys who needed to pay and pressured them immensely to do it. I went to sleep happy knowing the bill was paid, and the next morning I set up a request to the city to turn our power on while I had breakfast. Lo and behold, within a minute of my request, the power was back on (I know that's a coincidence but let me dream). Finally, Wade and I celebrated our return to a air-conditioned home with a night of pizza and anime. Now I just need to get my headphones working, and everything will be back to standard!