By Avery Rowlison
For Ruth Campbell ’11, Sam Redlitz ’11, Courtney Sheehan ’11, Esther Howe ’11 and Felicity Slater ’11, living in The Tutorial is a way for them to come full circle in their college experience, and not just because tutorial is the way every Grinnellian begins their years here.
The residents of The Tutorial began going to the house during their first year to make friends with a group of cool seniors who lived there. Now that they are living together in the house, they have essentially returned to the beginning of their off-campus housing experience as first-years.
The residents have knwn that they wanted to live together for a while, and Sheehan and Redlitz coordinated the arrangement. Howe, Slater and Campbell were abroad in the fall of 2009, so Sheehan and Redlitz sent out emails inquiring whether they all wanted to live together.
“I think I was a last-minute addition … because I got this email from Courtney like ‘I just assumed you were living with us,’” Campbell said.
“No, no. You were a first minute addition,” Howe said.
The house is actually two apartments made into one. Sheehan, Slater and Howe live on the second floor while Campbell and Redlitz live on the first, and the walls are very thin.
“Sometimes when I’m laying down to bed, I hear them [Slater, Howe and Sheehan] squealing in the bathroom,” Campbell said. “It’s really cute.”
“When we’re all really tired and slap happy and happen to be brushing our teeth at the same time, we just end up giggling,” Slater said.
“And we have the ‘Oh my god I’m in college’ moments together,’” Sheehan said.
There was a heated debate between the residents on what to call the house.
“One of our top contenders was Meow Meow Manor,” Slater said.
“And Bat Tree House,” Campbell said.
Another favorite was Kanye Redlitz, even though none of the residents can agree who came up with it.
“Basically all of us think that we came up with it,” Slater said.
Sheehan thought of the final name randomly one day.
“I called Ruth and told her the name, and [she] said, ‘You win.’ And then I bullied everyone into agreeing with me,” Sheehan said.
Even though the residents have been very close throughout their years at Grinnell, they still make efforts to bond as a house.
“We make a concerted family dinner effort,” Sheehan said.
They’ve also thrown some notable parties, such as the “Broad Street is the New High Street” party during the fall semester, which had been Redlitz’s idea as a joke.
“But Jai Garg [‘11, an Editor-in-Chief of the S&B] took it really seriously … and made it a personal vendetta against Broad Street,” Redlitz said. “So now it has kind of caught on.”
Redlitz is also a member of Grinnell Singers, and aside from hosting Singers’ parties, the girls are treated to his lovely singing voice throughout the day.
“I can hear Sam singing from downstairs,” Sheehan said. “It’s very beautiful.”
Another thing that the housemates are proud of is that they’ve never had to buy a single roll of toilet paper, and they’ve found some prime locations with extra rolls.
“Mostly [we steal it] from the library, definitely from ARH, definitely from Noyce,” Sheehan said. “So I guess you could say that another bonding ritual is me telling them to bring home toilet paper.”
One time they did steal toilet paper from Saint’s Rest, but they refuse to do that again even though they admit it was the nicest toilet paper they’ve ever had.
“We won’t do it again though because we support small businesses,” Sheehan said.
“And Courtney is scared of getting kicked out,” Campbell said.
However, the residents do acquire most of the items in the house through legal means. Some of their favorite additions to the house are the candelabra they picked up at Goodwill, the numerous old maps they got for free from Second Mile, the plush recliner in the sitting room, and the embroidered wall hanging Slater bought at Anderson’s Furniture. Their prized possessions are two little boxes that were designed by Alex Schechter ’10 that won an award in the student art salon.
“They basically watch over us,” Sheehan said.
