Roanoke Times
Copyright (c) 1995, Landmark Communications, Inc.
DATE: SUNDAY, August 21, 1994 TAG: 9408210047
SECTION: VIRGINIA PAGE: C-1 EDITION: METRO
SOURCE: STEPHEN FOSTER STAFF WRITER
DATELINE: BLACKSBURG LENGTH: Medium
Her soon-to-be-roommate's father struggled to put together a bed in the one-third of the room left uncluttered.
At 1:30 in the afternoon, she was tired and a little haggard. "This is all mine," she said, gesturing behind her. She drooped her shoulders in mock exhaustion. "We've been here since 9, and this is as far as we've gotten."
So went the day for the Virginia Tech freshman from York, Pa., as she joined more than 5,000 college students Saturday - moving-in time at the university.
On the lawn along Washington Street, which police turned into a one-way thoroughfare with parking on either side, Schraegle's roommate, Melissa Hill, hunkered on her share of stuff, waiting to move it upstairs.
"Another hour to get it in - and probably a week to get it all organized," she said. No worries, she claimed, about space constraints in the 12-by-14-foot room. "I'll get it all in there. I have to."
With the start of the school year just around the weekend, another August day of organized pandemonium evolved about her, although parents and police praised the relative ease with which the day's work proceeded.
With upperclass students helping people move in, four tractor-trailers of lofts and truckloads of refrigerators ready for pickup, and hot dogs sizzling on concession stand grills, the hordes had it all right.
Traffic backed up about a mile down the U.S. 460 bypass a couple of times, and at least one fender was bent in a parking lot, but by 2 p.m., Virginia Tech Police Lt. J.W. Cardwell proclaimed, "The worst is over." As he directed cars, vans and rental trucks to parking spaces on the fast-filling prairie lawn, Cardwell, a 23-year veteran of the department, said, "I think it works out better than it did a year ago, because we're more organized."
But moving is moving, and it's never easy.
"Too much like work," Dale Nowland yelled as he lugged part of his son's loft through Pritchard Hall. "They tell you to bring dollies," he said, "and there's a reason."
His youngest son, Giff, a freshman architecture student from Landenburg, Pa., stood in the room with entering freshman Jay Nutting of Leeds, Maine. What's the day been like? "Hell," said Nowland, who was quickly admonished for his language by his mom.
A line of women students and their parents stood in line for five to 10 minutes waiting for the elevator to take them up Slusher Tower. But by early afternoon, it was a lot quicker than it had been that morning, when the line stretched out the door.
"Very tiring," said Schraegle. "This is kind of very hectic." Her parents were somewhere else, looking for her computer, and she admitted to a bit of nervousness about Monday's start of the school year. "I have no idea where any of my classes are."
But most would advise her not to worry much.
Kristen Curley, 19, and Annie Tobin, 19, worked with friend Neal Hoffman to assemble a loft in their Slusher dorm room. All three are sophomores, a year older and a year more experienced. Curley and Tobin had come down a day early - most of the movers Saturday were freshmen - each with a suitcase of clothes. Their parents will bring the rest of their belongings today.
They expressed a modicum of sympathy for their younger counterparts.
A year ago, "We didn't know how to put the loft together; we didn't know how to do anything," Tobin said.
"We're a lot wiser now."
Memo: ***CORRECTION***