{"id":11304,"date":"2026-07-21T20:07:40","date_gmt":"2026-07-22T01:07:40","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/cherubs.medill.northwestern.edu\/2026\/?p=11304"},"modified":"2026-08-02T02:34:47","modified_gmt":"2026-08-02T07:34:47","slug":"sacrificed-sleep-bathroom-banter-and-bonding","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/cherubs.medill.northwestern.edu\/2026\/07\/sacrificed-sleep-bathroom-banter-and-bonding\/","title":{"rendered":"Sacrificed sleep, bathroom banter and bonding"},"content":{"rendered":"

It was midnight when I went into the bathroom. It was nearly 2 a.m. when I left.\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n

I\u2019m an only child. I\u2019ve never shared a building, a room or a bathroom with people my age.\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n

Still with heavy limbs, after a long couple days of moving in, reporting, socializing and more socializing, I rummaged for my toiletries and agonized over leaving my dorm room. <\/span>But hygiene was a priority, so with a <\/span>very<\/span><\/i> flattering frog-towel headband meant to keep my hair out of the way when washing my face, I made the 10-foot walk to the communal bathroom.<\/span><\/p>\n

I smiled (slightly) at the girl who was there. We had chatted a bit earlier in the Great Room but only in a group setting. While we brushed our teeth, we began a conversation about our first Medill experiences that transitioned into high school stories.<\/span><\/p>\n

Nearly two hours later, by now squatting uncomfortably on the bathroom floor with our phones facedown to ignore the time, we anguished over early class without making a move to leave.<\/span><\/p>\n

Talking with her was the first of many deep conversations at Medill. I now felt eager to be a cherub. Living with people meant knowing them beyond their polished selves. Empathy is easy to find when you do everything together.<\/span><\/p>\n

She and I met in the bathroom to debrief many more times.\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n

Nearly every night, I have attempted to go to bed early, only to find someone else to talk to in the halls or a common space.<\/span><\/p>\n

I now stay downstairs until a minute before curfew, initiate early-morning roommate conversations and trespass in fellow cherubs\u2019 rooms to gossip. The concept of constantly being surrounded by others was nerve-wracking, but it gave me close friends, and I happily sacrifice my sleep just to share another moment with them.<\/span><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

When cherubs meet while brushing their teeth, connections last a while.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":344,"featured_media":11451,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"inline_featured_image":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[16],"tags":[],"ppma_author":[639],"class_list":["post-11304","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-experiences"],"acf":[],"authors":[{"term_id":639,"user_id":344,"is_guest":0,"slug":"romney26","display_name":"Zoe Romney","avatar_url":"https:\/\/secure.gravatar.com\/avatar\/d5b7944882831997cef5558cc2083ebc4e3d84446bf52ee1317b00bba5fe439e?s=96&d=mm&r=g","author_category":"","user_url":"","last_name":"Romney","first_name":"Zoe","job_title":"","description":""}],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/cherubs.medill.northwestern.edu\/2026\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/11304","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/cherubs.medill.northwestern.edu\/2026\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/cherubs.medill.northwestern.edu\/2026\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/cherubs.medill.northwestern.edu\/2026\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/344"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/cherubs.medill.northwestern.edu\/2026\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=11304"}],"version-history":[{"count":11,"href":"https:\/\/cherubs.medill.northwestern.edu\/2026\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/11304\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":12878,"href":"https:\/\/cherubs.medill.northwestern.edu\/2026\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/11304\/revisions\/12878"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/cherubs.medill.northwestern.edu\/2026\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/11451"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/cherubs.medill.northwestern.edu\/2026\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=11304"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/cherubs.medill.northwestern.edu\/2026\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=11304"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/cherubs.medill.northwestern.edu\/2026\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=11304"},{"taxonomy":"author","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/cherubs.medill.northwestern.edu\/2026\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/ppma_author?post=11304"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}