My name is Eliezer, and I’m a yeshivah bachur. In the beginning of the year, I came to the dorm excited and full of expectations. I had many she’ifos to succeed, and I hoped the physical conditions would be good as well. A seat near the window is not like one near the door; one right across from the AC is not like one distant from any source of air; and a place near the maggid shiur could not compare to a place far away from him.
If this is true regarding the heichal halimud, how much more true is it in the dorm rooms. During the hours when you gather strength for the next day, you need to sleep calmly and without disturbance. That influences the whole day, and the following night as well. I worried about the room, and that’s why we organized ourselves ahead of time, putting together a group of serious bachurim who wanted to utilize their time, more or less.
During the first days of the zeman I discovered that I had all types of roommates. There was the good, pleasant one, the one who was always late or always early, the one who always had snacks to give out, and the one who always took snacks from others. And there was someone who...I don’t want to talk about him, but his behavior was such that it made it impossible for me to be together with him. I suffered from him; I simply suffered.
I decided to move to another room. But the bachur got wind of my plan, and it did not find favor in his eyes. For each room I tried switching to, he got there before me and said what he said, so that no one would want to allow me to join. I don’t know why I brought out the worst in his personality, don’t know why he saw me as an enemy. The more time passed, the more impossible the situation became. He simply abused me; he left all kinds of dirty objects on my bed, and I had to deal with them on my own when it was time to go to sleep.
I kept quiet. I did not want to take revenge. I felt how ugly that would be, and I knew that I would not be the one who spoke badly about the other. During those moments when I went over to my bed to find it filled with unidentifiable objects, I asked Hashem that my keeping quiet should be a zechus for a 47-year-old bachur I knew, so that he would find his shidduch, and for the refuah of the mother of one of the bachurim in our yeshivah who’d had a stroke.
I did this simple hishtadlus in order to make things easier for me, and I went to the staff and asked, without providing any reason why, to switch rooms.
The next day I got exciting news: My friend’s mother was out of the ICU.
Less than a week later, there was news shaking the walls of the yeshivah: The 47-year-old bachur was engaged!!
And what about my room? A few days later the mashgiach told me to switch rooms, and I had barely dared to dream about a wonderful room like the one I ended up in, filled with serious, pleasant bachurim, baruch Hashem!
