ȼƟɱƿᶅɘẋǐǂɎ

This blog is to be considered on hiatus until further notice.

Continue checking up on the other two, as they’re more semi-regularly updated still.

I’ve never personally had to experience with how hectic the last day for moving out it on campus. Over half of my residents were still here this morning, most simply because they chose to party on Thursday night instead of moving out. I woke up late in the AM to find lofts being torn down, disastrous messes in the hallway, and music coming from all corners. In contrast, last year I was done with finals by Wednesday, and honestly just wanted to get off campus and back to Toledo. I didn’t even see my roommate before I left (though I had no issue with that).

This year, everything has completely changed. Not only did I have finals all the way through Thursday (late) night, but I’m flat out required to be here for closing as a mentor. Even after closing happened tonight, I’m still here! I’ll be working my double, getting paid enough to (hopefully) buy the food I need for the next month, and sleeping most of tomorrow before enjoying myself!

Toledo practically isn’t even a part of my life anymore. My parents live in its relative proximity, but I don’t know when, if ever, I’m going to be making an extended stay there again. This summer, I’ll be in East Lansing working night security in a sports camp, then I go straight back to classes in August. As for next summer, I’m thoroughly planning on studying abroad at the University of London. Exciting times are ahead!

No mentor really ever wants to write up their own residents. We’re the people our floor is supposed to come to for advice, and that’s certainly not going to happen if the resident is angry or bitter with us. For this reason, it makes it incredibly difficult to decide when enough is enough. With this job comes experience, though, and it only becomes easier to put yourself into a position for arbitration. Scare tactics aren’t ever really that necessary, but if you can isolate someone into believing they’re the only one doing something wrong, then it becomes a matter of trying to fit in. This is usually the approach I take when writing out e-mails: They’re blind-carbon-copied so no one knows if it’s for just them or the entire floor.

Sometimes e-mail isn’t enough, though. Face-to-face then is usually the only option left before leaving an issue to a higher power than myself. In this case it’s proven to be the only necessary action, but I’m really hoping that I don’t have to end the year on a bad note with a few choice individuals. I’ve given my warnings, and now it’s up to them to adhere.

Being a mentor (read: RA) and night receptionist you have plenty of stories to tell. Add being gay, a human biology major, an honors student, and a future med-student, then suddenly things aren’t quite as straight-forward as they could be.

I’m Jack and intend on using this blog for those of you that wish to skim the surface–that is, learn about me generally, hear some good stories from my jobs, and just begin to understand what goes through my head–in a completely professional manner, of course.

If superficialities aren’t quite your thing and you’d like to have a bit of a deeper understanding of how I feel, how I function, how I cope, and how I live day-to-day, then my other blog is probably a better choice. Some posts will leak over from one to the other, but for the most part I aim to keep this very clean-cut and ordered. My other blog? Not so much.