The Scarlet & Black

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The Scarlet & Black

The Scarlet & Black

The Hotel Lobby ignites the night

Rebecca+Rea-Holloway+%E2%80%9915%2C+Dylan+Fisher%2C+Samantha+Schwartz%2C+Peter+Grein%2C+Hutch+Freeland%2C+Linnea+Van+Pilsum-Bloom+and+Charlotte+Hechler+%28all+%E2%80%9914%29+set+the+mood+with+scented+candles+and+their+plastic+baby.%0A%0APhoto+by+Emma+Sinai-Yunker.
Rebecca Rea-Holloway ’15, Dylan Fisher, Samantha Schwartz, Peter Grein, Hutch Freeland, Linnea Van Pilsum-Bloom and Charlotte Hechler (all ’14) set the mood with scented candles and their plastic baby. Photo by Emma Sinai-Yunker.

For the residents of 1018 East Street, their home is an after-party to regular life at Grinnell. Dylan Fisher, Peter Grein, Hutch Freeland, Charlotte Hechler, Samantha Schwartz, Linnea Van Pilsum-Bloom (all ’14) and Becca Rea-Holloway ’15 refer to their house as ‘The Hotel Lobby,’ per the lyrics of the classic folk standard “Ignition (Remix)” by legendary singer-songwriter Pete Seeger. For the members of The Hotel Lobby, home is a place to return to for days of friendship and food and nights of fun and frivolity.

“We really liked the song ‘Remix to Ignition’ and so it comes from that song, I think, right?” Van Pilsum-Bloom said, which the rest of the group quickly confirmed with a loud “YES!”

Rebecca Rea-Holloway ’15, Dylan Fisher, Samantha Schwartz, Peter Grein, Hutch Freeland, Linnea Van Pilsum-Bloom and Charlotte Hechler (all ’14) set the mood with scented candles and their plastic baby. Photo by Emma Sinai-Yunker.
Rebecca Rea-Holloway ’15, Dylan Fisher, Samantha Schwartz, Peter Grein, Hutch Freeland, Linnea Van Pilsum-Bloom and Charlotte Hechler (all ’14) set the mood with scented candles and their plastic baby.
Photo by Emma Sinai-Yunker.

Longtime friends, Fisher, Freeland, Hechler and Van Pilsum-Bloom experienced living together in the Haines first co-op during the fall 2012 semester, but the others weren’t too far away. Schwartz was the hall Student Advisor (SA), while Grein lived on the floor above. Even though the group temporarily splintered the following semester, with many members going abroad, little has changed from that time in terms of their friendships.

“[We] went abroad and, though we weren’t great about communicating all the time, [when] we came back together it was just like normal,” Schwartz said.
The group’s genesis goes back even further to the fourth-years’ first few months at Grinnell, though Rea-Holloway—who took a gap year after graduating from high school in 2010—had, of course, not yet arrived at Grinnell.

“Becca didn’t really belong,” Grein teased.

“But now she belongs!” Schwartz assured.

Rea-Holloway’s addition to the group ended up being the best for everyone, however, as she lived in 1018 over last summer and was able to test out the house for the rest of her housemates.

The safety of the house is still somewhat uncertain, however. The previous resident had a “smoking room” in the basement, where the residents believe he sat alone and smoked for hours. The room is now locked and, according to the group, potentially full of ghosts or corpses.

However, the Hotel Lobby’s amenities far outweigh these possible drawbacks. The house includes a washer, dryer, dishwasher and partial air conditioning.

“The shower pressure is pretty good in [the basement]” Fisher added.
When this issue went to press, it was unconfirmed whether the ideal water pressure in the basement could be due to the supernatural forces in question.

Over the summer, the house had a whole different set of equally terrifying issues to deal with. Plagued by the constant fluttering of a colony of bats, the house temporarily took on the name ‘Bat House’ until the infestation could be addressed. Hechler and Rea-Holloway had an impromptu shrieking contest when, attempting to hide from one bat, they barricaded themselves in the bathroom.

Van Pilsum-Bloom, a healthily temperate presence in the house, wants to discourage this type of reaction to bats.

“I talked to the Batman [the bat exterminator] when he came, and he told me that bats are so misrepresented in American society because they don’t bother you if you don’t bother them,” she said.

The group has not let these minor disagreements over the proper treatment of bats negatively impact their friendships, as they are happy to simply be back under the same roof.

“We’re getting back into the swing of things, Freeland explained. “We cherish now the moments where we can all be in the house at the same time.”

Though it is rare for all of the residents to be at 1018 at the same time, the friends make sure to come together for at least one meal a week. Past home-cooked meals have included Indian, Sri Lankan and Egyptian themes—all of these being countries where house-members studied abroad during the previous spring.

These get-togethers do not come without some complications. Because there are so many residents at The Hotel Lobby, it is often difficult to find enough silverware for all seven of them. The group resorts to eating food, even rice or beans, with their hands.

The same issue does not apply to drinking vessels.

“We got cups up the wazoo,” Freeland clarified.

The gang also finds ways to spend quality time together outside of the house. Many of them regularly attend Pub Quiz on Wednesday nights, participating on the almost alarmingly stacked two-time Quiz champions ‘G-Spot Fitzgerald.’ And when they are not in the mood to cook, they head into town for a meal, Prairie Canary being a house favorite.

But from time to time, the housemates like to enjoy the simple things in life, such as the cheap things they find at the thrift store.

“We’ll take the wheelchair out for a spin,” Grein said.

The combination of longstanding friendships, struggles for survival and appreciation for good food has allowed these seven friends to create a bond that will surely extend beyond their time at Grinnell.

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