So I guess I’m lucky. Because I’m graduating, I won’t be living on campus next year – assuming I pass all my classes this semester. I think I’m subconsciously rooting for myself to fail at least one so I can put off the job hunts and economic recessions for at least a few more months. But as it is right now, I didn’t have to scramble to make living arrangements for next year. Back in my good old freshman days, my roommates and I signed the lease for an apartment that, at the time, we thought was pretty sweet. Even after living in that hole for a month, we decided to sign on for another year in the same apartment.

So I guess I’m lucky. Because I’m graduating, I won’t be living on campus next year – assuming I pass all my classes this semester. I think I’m subconsciously rooting for myself to fail at least one so I can put off the job hunts and economic recessions for at least a few more months.

But as it is right now, I didn’t have to scramble to make living arrangements for next year. Back in my good old freshman days, my roommates and I signed the lease for an apartment that, at the time, we thought was pretty sweet. Even after living in that hole for a month, we decided to sign on for another year in the same apartment.

Now, I’ve been living in that same dirty space (and, yes, it was dirty before we got there) with stained carpets and chips of plaster falling off the walls for more than a year and a half. That’s equivalent to at least a decade in college residence years.

This place is really gross. We have what we can only assume is vomit encrusted in our screen door and what looks like a ketchup stain on our living room ceiling. We’ve tried to clean both with no success. Now we just try not to look at them.

My bedroom window is drafty, and during the winter months, the condensation begins freezing on its inside. We also have footprints on our walls.

Even with all the problems, some of my current roommates elected to next year move next door to a nearly identical, slightly larger apartment. The location on campus is too good to pass up, they say.

Or maybe it’s just the convenience of not having to search again. That’s what kept us here last year.

But the more I complain about it, the less I’m able to imagine myself living somewhere else. I’ve made this awful place the anchor of my college experience. It’s my getaway from class and work, and it’s a reliable place to pass out after long nights at the bars.

Now I feel more at home in my Champaign apartment than I do at my permanent residence in suburban Chicago. Sure, it’ll be the butt of a few jokes decades from now when I’m reminiscing about my U of I days with old friends. But we’ll tell those jokes with an odd affection for our old college residence.

Of course, there will always be those students who feel the need to switch apartments from year to year, in search of new experiences. Or maybe they have false hopes of nicer living spaces. After a while, I can imagine you get a nomadic feeling doing that, feeling constantly away from home.

I’m glad I stuck in my sad excuse for an apartment as long as I did. While it might not have felt homey at first, I made it my home. And my friends made it a common convening place.

So while this year I don’t have to worry about the frantic apartment crawl looking for next year’s living arrangements, I probably wouldn’t have done that anyway. I like where I am, and I urge anyone still searching to consider staying where you are, or if that’s already taken, at least somewhere familiar to you. Don’t worry about the grossness. It’ll grow on you.

And if I didn’t completely turn you off from it, my apartment is still available for next year. Just make sure you take care of it. I wouldn’t want anything to be cleaned up or fixed.