Roomates for life

This has taken me a long time. I thought it had to be perfect, I wanted to capture everything Emily ever was to me. My roommate and best friend for four years, how do you sum that up? I wanted to reinforce how amazing she is. Events in her life that few would dare to measure up to, how do you share them all? The truth is, I need to do none of this. I just need to share a little of my own…

Emily was placed as my roommate freshmen year, if you know me at all, I could have not been luckier because not only was she amazing but she was a JERSEY GIRL!!!! I find myself struggling to grasp my favorite memory with her. All I know is that nothing could tear us apart, we remain roommates for life!

Our second 'Anything but Clothes Party'- We upgraded from saran wrap ;-)

We have had a variety of different groups of friends, the ‘originals’ freshmen year (while I dated Bryan she dated Jason (his big) for a short time period), the short-lived DTD crew (I was friends with Tim and she dated Zach), Friel and crew (while I dated Friel she dated both Ed and their neighbor Mark) and then the PSP clan (she joined the frat and I fell in love with a brother of PSP, Sam). And of course, we always had our ‘girls’ which was an evolving group of girls that had one thing in common, be the worst influences on each other and make sure each other always chose partying over anything responsible.

Some of our girls before the Ludacris concert

I have video upon video of crazy times with Emily. I wish I took more. Some of my favorites are from the infamous parties we used to have or Alicia would have that always involved some sort of table dancing.

My favorite memory with Emily is more of a sketchy Ash story than sketchy Em, what can I say, she rubbed off on me!

I went to Spain for spring break while she was studying abroad in Switzerland. I had been in town for 5 hours and we were getting ready for a ‘pub crawl.’ This is when I first met Meghan also. At each new bar we were greeted with a new shot and drink and we managed to swoon one of the guys in charge of the crawl into buying us even more drinks.

Me, Meghan, Emily, and the crawl guy

At one point I remember having beer squirted in my mouth by the same device that you use to distribute weed repellant… Needless to say, it was just another crazy night with my roomie for life. We decided we needed to get back to the hostel and embarked. Emily was working on a Spanish minor, but the booze combined with her current Italian studies seemed to be getting us nowhere for getting directions home. I decided I would use my knowledge of French and what I have heard from her of Spanish to get us home. Emily claims that I was speaking a language that wasn’t even close to any of the Romance Languages. Somehow we managed to find our way.

She had commonly described my language, ‘Ashley language’, that night to be the same as when I did karaoke with her. She was awesome at karaoke; I was most honored when she dedicated her first rendition at VT of Shoop to me at BW3s. I on the other hand needed quite a few drinks in me to get up the courage to even do a duet with her. By time I was ready, the combination of the drinks and the stress of not being able to sing made my words come out as if I was ‘speaking Ashley language.’

Karaoke at TOTS - Showing off the Ashley language

Recently I went to a local place to do karaoke with some intern friends down here in Houston. I was surprised when one of the girls asked me to do Shoop with her, so random. I knew Emily was watching, so I stopped drinking, got up to that mike and dedicated my rendition to her. It felt amazing.

I love all of the ‘to-do’ lists I have seen on the blog. I of course had my own list with her and managed to cross off the first thing a couple of weekends ago. I went to Bonnaroo where Ben Folds was playing and we had planned to see him. I get sad sometimes, knowing there are things that I can’t cross off on my own. When she returned from Ireland she immediately reserved her spot as the planner of my bachelorette party and I had zero hesitation agreeing.

But how can I let myself get sad when I know that I was blessed to spend four amazing years with the greatest angel that has ever walked this great wide world.

Emily at the Alahambra in Spain

If nothing, I should be smiling constantly because that is what she taught me, hell, taught all of us. I’m taking advantage of every opportunity possible and making the most of every moment more than ever because there is no better way to remember her.

This blog just goes to show that she has touched so many lives and continues to do so. Keep the stories coming because it keeps me smiling down here in lonely Houston!


Love Always, Ashley