Where I Live: For TCU Student, Home Is Where Her Sisters Are

Arlington TX

01 November, 2021

12:55 PM

Description

By Kristen Barton, Fort Worth Report October 31, 2021 Home is where I'm surrounded by the people I love. Whether this is in my hometown, Santa Barbara, California, or in Fort Worth, what makes a home a home is the people you share it with. This year, I'm a sophomore at Texas Christian University and living in the Kappa Alpha Theta sorority house. It's hard to describe the dynamic of my living situation because despite being called a "house," it feels much more like an all-girls dorm than anything else. But I wouldn't want it any other way. Coming into TCU as a freshman, I was nervous to leave the house I lived in for my entire life in Santa Barbara, but it didn't take long before I started calling my shoebox-sized room in Foster Hall "home." The first time it slipped out and I told my sister on the phone that I was walking "home" from class, I couldn't believe I called my room that. After this, I realized that the day I became best friends with my neighbors is the day that TCU became home. It wasn't when I perfectly decorated my room, or when it was most clean, the moment TCU became home was when I found a community around me. Dorm life has its pros and cons, but at the end of the day it's something I believe all college students should experience. The communal showers and the dark hallways will not be missed, but the liveliness and the relationships formed will be. Living in a dorm forced me into more unexpected friendships than I can count — and it changed my college experience for the better. To read the full article, click here. Fort Worth Report is a nonpartisan, nonprofit news organization that produces factual, in-depth journalism about city and county government, schools, healthcare, business, and arts and culture in Tarrant County. Always free to read; subscribe to newsletters, read coverage or support our newsroom at fortworthreport.org.