523 Malcolm Hall, University of California, Davis 95616

It's hard to believe, but Trevor has 8 weeks left in his junior year of high school. He just received his schedule for the first semester of his senior year. In the fall, he'll be applying to college. Where does the time go?!

I started college 33 years ago, in 1990. I had to double-check my math because I couldn't believe that it had possibly been that long, but it has. A lot has changed on the campus since I moved into 523 Malcolm Hall as a freshman. I'm sure a lot has changed within Malcolm Hall itself. But I'm one of the luckier ones, as the dorm I lived in is still standing. Many have been replaced since 1990 and I'm guessing it's only a matter of time before a more modern building replaces the one that was my home from 1990-1992. 

I wanted to document what my dorm looked like before it was too late. I never took photos of the building (I took very, very few photos during college), but I was able to find one on the Davis Wiki from the correct era. The UC Davis website has floorplans of Malcolm Hall, which match what they looked like 33 years ago. 

In two years, I literally NEVER went on Malcolm 2, 3, or 4, although I passed by them on the staircases multiple times a day. I hate waiting for elevators. Even now, I'd much rather climb five flights of stairs. Anyway, only the first and fifth floors of Malcolm Hall were part of my college experience, so I printed those floorplans and added them to this layout. 

Malcolm 5 (affiliate link)

As you can see, I added a heart sticker to my room, 523. It had a great view of the large lawn below, as well as a great view into the rooms of literally everyone across that lawn in Bixby Hall. Close your curtains when you change clothes, especially at night when you are backlit! 

My room was directly across from the door into the women's restroom, which we kept open at all times, as was the bathroom door in front of 510. All the women, and most of the men, would cut through the women's bathroom to get to from one side of the hall to the other, rather than walking around by the back staircase. That didn't happen very much with the men's room, since those doors were pretty close to the elevator and people just walked the extra distance. 

The yellow space you see on the left was our lounge. It was large and comfy, with big windows and lots of couches, plus a tiny kitchenette. It was not a great place for studying, but it was a good place to hang out with friends. The grey space on the right was the laundry room. We used to hoard quarters to use for laundry; I wonder if they use cards or another more modern system now. I'll never forget the guy who lived in 520. While most of the guys washed their sheets and towels maybe once a month, he washed his EVERY. SINGLE. DAY. Literally, he would get out of bed, strip the sheets, and put them in the washing machine. Finish showering, and put the towel in the washing machine. Wear a jacket, wash it afterwards. It was what his mom had done, and he didn't realize the rest of the world didn't do that until he moved in with 49 other freshmen who thought he was insane. Still, he refused to bend to peer pressure and continued to wash everything daily. 

Here's a look of the lobby of Malcolm Hall:

The green area was where our mailboxes were. The blue rooms were bathrooms. The first yellow room on the left had a piano and the second had a bunch of tables. The large yellow room had couches and the only TV in the building. Most of the building would gather to watch SNL most Saturday nights. Continuing to the right, we had covered bike parking. Motor vehicles can't go in the inner parts of the Davis campus, so everyone gets around on bikes. It's part of what I love the most about UCD. 

I also found this while poking around on the UCD site. 

I'm so glad to have the scrapbook layout, and now this blog post, about the dorm where I lived during the 1990-1991 and 1991-1992 school years. So many great memories!