Living in the basement of Nic 5 facing the mess of cinderblock that was once Fauver field, those along this edge of the construction and I have been very patient all year.
I tried to think of the jackhammers at 7 a.m. as an alarm clock. I chose to ignore the workers who felt screaming was a necessary step in the process of bricklaying, and the trucks backing up, then moving forward, and then backing up again before sunrise. I tried to tune out the 4 a.m. deliveries and pretend that the water being turned off was an exciting endeavor in water conservation. I ignored the construction fence five feet from my window, and learned to accept that opening it meant a dust storm in my room.
I drew the line, however, when a LOUD, FLAMING FURNACE was placed fifteen feet from my window and left on all night more than once.
I went to speak with the various powers-that-be at ResLife about the situation, and the general consensus was that I had no right to be complaining. “Life is hard,” I was told. “Sometimes we just need to learn to deal with it.” If I felt I couldn’t live in my room, I should “find a friend’s floor to sleep on.” While that may be a solution for drunkenness, it is not a resolution for trying to avoid a fiery racket in the middle of the night.
Any kind of compensation, rebates or special preference for housing next year was out of the question. “That’d be unfair,” I was informed, because I guess paying the same price as students with a quiet, peaceful room is really the embodiment of fairness.
ResLife did promise to “touch base” with us in the future about “looking into throwing the affected residents a pizza party for putting up with the disturbances.” A PIZZA PARTY! ResLife is full of great solutions.
Eventually I had my parents call the University and, miraculously, many levels of Administration suddenly felt “extreme sympathy” for the “extreme discomfort” those in the hall had experienced. Administrators even started dropping by my dorm room to demonstrate their relentless compassion.
To be fair, the noise from the furnace has since been reduced thanks to a sound barrier. Construction services has been accommodating in listening to our complaints about excessive noise before 7 a.m., although loud noises still manage to wake us up every morning.
ResLife, however, has continued to act as though any kind of compensation for our substandard living situation is a ridiculous, unfeasible suggestion. When accused of not caring about what we were saying at a recent meeting, the interim director of ResLife informed us that if she didn’t care, she would be at home kissing her children goodnight instead of meeting with us. Aw. Life is hard, isn’t it?
In conclusion (although there hasn’t really been a conclusion to this tale of bureaucracy, despair and abundant base-touching), sure, it’s nice that Wesleyan is small enough that one is able to walk across campus and actually speak with someone about a problem. But don’t expect them to actually do anything about it.
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