If you’re anything like me, you’re a huge homebody. You love home cooked meals, sleeping in your full-sized bed with no roommate(s) bothering you and being able to take a shower without flip flops. However, living at home and commuting to school comes with its own set of obstacles.
1. South P
With over 25,000 students enrolled at Stony Brook University, finding a place to park on campus is going to be nearly impossible. Unless you wake up at the crack of dawn to park in North P or the Gym Road lots, you’re going to have to park in the dreaded South P lot, wait on the line by Wolfie’s Hut for the express bus, be lucky enough to get a seat on said bus, breathe out of your mouth for the next 10 minutes because people smell and then take a lovely stroll to the SAC loop on campus. Fun, right?
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2. Parking Enforcement
Parking is enforced from seven in the morning to four in the afternoon in most of the lots on campus. Anyone who has had the pleasure of dealing with the lovely humans of parking enforcement knows how savage they are. For instance, I parked in a metered lot (which I never do) and parking enforcement was waiting by my car to ticket me when the meter ran out. Like, don’t you have anything better to do?
3. Naps (Or Lack Thereof)
Commuters often plan their classes back to back so that they can go to class and go home. However, since SOLAR hates us, lots of us will have class and then a three-hour break until our next class. Resident students have the luxury of going to their dorms and taking a nice slumber while we commuters have two (or three) options if we’re feeling sleepy: attempt a car nap; attempt a nap in the SAC or Library commuter lounge; or down 14 espresso shots. (Disclaimer: I do not recommend the last option!) When personally faced with this dilemma, since I physically cannot bring myself to nap anywhere except for my bed, despite how tired I am, I will end up grabbing some Starbucks and forcing myself to stay awake.
4. Getting Involved
It is not impossible to get involved as a commuter, it just requires more effort because Stony Brook tends to have group meetings late at night, thus giving us commuters a long break to either go home and come back (let’s face it, once I’m home and my pants are off, there is no turning back), or stay on campus and either do the commuter nap or get some work done in the library. I am personally very involved as a commuter. I am not going to say that it’s easy, but if you’re determined (and caffeinated), you will find that getting involved is one of the best things you can do for yourself at Stony Brook! Just use your breaks wisely.
5. Traffic
I’m pretty lucky in the sense that I live three towns away from Stony Brook, but I feel terrible for the people who drive here from way out East, Nassau, Queens, or beyond. My commute is roughly 20 minutes long, but if I hit traffic, it can take double that time! Tack on finding a parking spot in South P, taking the bus and walking to class — that’s yet another 20 minutes! Everybody knows that Nicolls Road and 347 (Nesconset Highway) can be a hot mess, so we commuters try our hardest to plan our drive time accordingly, to avoid wanting to rip our hair out because we’ve been in the same spot for the last 8 minutes!
6. Pooping
Yeah, that’s right, I said it. We all poop. Commuters and residents alike, so this isn’t really just a commuter problem. When duty calls, and you’re stuck on campus, where do you go? The SAC and library bathrooms are a huge no-no, so I guess we’re screwed until we go home.
7. Carrying Our Lives With Us
If you were to open up my backpack you would find my laptop, some pens, a couple of notebooks, a sweater, a waterbottle, my wallet, my keys, some deodorant (major key to success), lotion, 7,271 bobby pins, a small child and the Taj Mahal. We don’t have the luxury of going back and forth to our dorms, and our cars are packed in Narnia, so we just have to carry it all with us. But hey, at least, we’ll be prepared.
8. Parties
When it’s Friday night and you’re exhausted from a long week of commuting, class, work, and life, and all you want to do is sleep, your resident counterparts are getting ready to go out to that big banger that everyone has been talking about. You’ve been invited, but you don’t really know what to do. You have two options: stay in bed and continue binge watching that show on Netflix, or let your FOMO (fear of missing out) get the best of you and drive out to school, get a ride to that party, and have fun (responsibly, of course). Once you are at that party, you can either be Sober Sally, or crash on your friend’s floor in her dorm room. I mean hey, that’s what college IS for, right?
9. Parents
Don’t get me wrong, I LOVE my parents to death, and I appreciate how much they care about me, but it would be nice if I didn’t have to deal with the “when are you going to be home” texts. While I know that may sound a little bitchy, lots of commuter students feel the same way on this topic. As a commuter, my parents always know where I am and when I’m going to be home, which can get a little frustrating because I want to be an adult, but at the same time, I am living under their roof and I need to respect them. It still would be nice, though, to be able to go out and about and not have to check in with them!
10. ….
Eh, who am I kidding? There is no number 10, at least not one that I can think of! Overall, commuting is great, I love my school friends and I love coming home to my family, so it’s safe to say that I really am blessed to have the best of both worlds!
