A Case Study of Aldrich Hall

By ROWAN WILSON

As I arrived hunchbacked and sweatshirted on that fateful and sweaty August day, I was informed the room I was assigned had been terminated with explosions (they tried to paint it for some reason) and I was to instead become a third generation of my family to stay in Aldrich Hall. This line is thankfully ending with my transgender ass.

The fact that a family could even make it to three generations of Beloit students is unreasonable enough, but despite all odds, there I was, directed to a very cobweb covered but otherwise unassuming colonial building.

At first glance, nothing beats it–oh baby, that backrooms yellow glow, those browning circular lights plastered onto the walls, the doors that only open half the time, and the ceiling paint flaking off in sheafs in one growing stain-immediately a five star review. I knew I was in for a year.

The most disappointing thing I could state was that my father found the hall to look “basically the same” as when he inhabited it in the stone age (1988, before he abandoned it for “the good frat”.)

One month of inhabiting it answered some of my initial questions (what hours of the night can you always find Liam doing his laundry? 1 am. Where are the most comfortable study spaces? In the ceiling tiles. Which shower spontaneously generates the least dense carpet of wet hair? Not the nearest twelve.) But for every answer, three more questions have popped up in their place, predominantly: how the hell did we end up here?

So here I am, compiling my findings for all sorry inhabitants of this purgatory, and my condolences to the dead body I’m convinced must be stuffed in the boarded up fireplace in my cigarette-butt single –the infamous G12.

Observations on my room run as follows, to quote Calvin’s Dad from The Comic:

Character (shaped like a particularly lengthy closet)

Character (bermuda triangle of cell service – every phone is confirmed a brick the moment you step in!)

Character (aforementioned boarded up fireplace with suspicious scratches down the side)

Character (nonfunctional outlet crudely cut out of the cupboard and several inches into drywall)

Character (graffiti on inside of cupboard: “days spent:” followed by a series of tally marks) (perhaps a particularly unlucky student became trapped in this cupboard)

Character (more graffiti on inside of cupboard: juvenile rendition of a naked man with spectacularly disproportionate abs, a la 6th grade carving in desk)

Obviously, I had to add more Character, so I endeavored over the next few weeks to create the modern art piece it now is, complete with:

Rusty chain pulled from lake hanging from ceiling

Bartholomew (the handless skeleton)

One goblet and one medicine container full of unwashed animal bones

Potion of healing (several hundred ibuprofen tablets in decorative jar)

Plastic mantlepiece gun

Other assorted pieces of rusty metal

Testosterone scissors

Crime and punishment – the classic novel by Fyodor Dostoevsky

Venturing past my own wet cardboard box with a pillow in it, though, we must examine the rest of this thoroughly perplexing freshman experience.

The centerpiece installation of this dorm is the ground floor lobby. Step inside, if you can (you have to approach the doors slowly with your hands in the air, so as not to frighten them) and you’ll be faced with an amalgamation of seemingly spontaneously generated walls, chairs, and tables. Nearby we have the coveted filtered water fountain pouring water all over the floors unattended at 2 AM – which is honestly embarrassing…it should stop that. Across the hall we have the laundry room, accompanied at all times by seventeen pairs of one identical Dri-Fit sock.

To go upstairs you might be tempted to choose one of two edifices of rust that serve for staircases, but for the full experience, we’ll need to head to the elevator.

The elevator is a topic of interest, alright. The smell is one thing, but when it manages to get puked in twice in one week, that’s no mystery. What is a mystery, of course, is its quirky little tendency to simply act on its own.

This little rascal beeps. Oh boy will it beep at you, with the insistence and expectation of a cat at 3 AM. Sometimes it likes to take you to the mystery floor, or not open at all, or say hello to you by ominously opening its doors to reveal no one at all inside. It does this often enough I’ve started to greet it as well!All of you might do just as well following in my footsteps so it doesn’t think you’re mad at it and take you to an unlikely grave.

If the elevator chooses to accept you, you might be transported into the mystical realms above ground. From my long and onerous examination of the body whose organs I reside within, a pattern emerged pretty quickly.

If the ground floor is purgatory, the first floor is hell, with perks like month old sink water, better but hairier bathrooms, and the abandoned spider balcony (second only to the Powerhouse balcony, which upon closer examination may be entirely comprised of spiders.)

I am convinced that the second floor is not real, and no one lives there – encountered only accidentally, late at night, when the elevator thinks you a friend – its lounge pristine and luxurious, its halls silent and free of Potato Chip Fallout Zones.

Finally, with your sleeve over your nose, the elevator releases you gently in the lounge of the third and final floor (which happens to be the fourth floor). Many of you may have heard stories about the third floor. Stories about how they’re “unreal”, “off the walls” or, dare I say it, “bonkers insane.”

The truth of the matter is that there are two things you can do on the third floor: rearrange the 20 identical recliners into increasingly unreasonable configurations while too drunk to see straight, and watch hit seinen anime series Bungou Stray Dogs while several hyper autists call a shirtless Mark Twain “babygirl”.

As much as we love this beautiful home of ours, it is clear that something is deeply wrong.

In conclusion, I think the root of this problem is that we need to find the dead body.

Pictures and cutlines by me: