Welcome to the Vortex

10 years ago, Sydney White hit the box office with America’s sweetheart Amanda Bynes as the lead. She graced the screen with her tomboyish charm alongside the members of the Vortex. While the rise and fall of Amanda Bynes could warrant its own blog, my focus is on the Vortex, or rather my modern-day (read: 10 years later) take on it.

For those of you who haven’t seen the movie, I’ll give a quick recap of the most important parts;

Sydney White goes to college and attempts to join her deceased mother’s sorority. Sydney is super cool, down to earth, and everyone loves her except the president of the sorority who becomes jealous of her and banishes her from joining. Sydney gets pretty sad until she finds the Vortex, a dilapidated haven for the seven quirky boys who live there. Sydney and the seven boys join together to try to take down the sorority president for promoting exclusivity and bullying (Robinson & Nussbaum, 2007).

Sydney meets the Vortex

This year, I’m a senior at the University of Michigan living in a house with seven other girls on Greenwood Avenue. Greenwood is a short, one-way street south of campus notorious for its block parties. Ann Arbor landlords have the easy job of "creating" customer value: having a mostly livable structure in a popular area (bonus if it's painted a bright color!) (Gupta, 2014). We all ended up here, paying too high of rent in our mildly scary and majorly cramped house and trash-plagued street because these costs are lesser than value we receive from living on one of the most recognized and fabled streets for undergrad students at U of M.  The hedonic attributes of our house are its location, its backyard, and its front porch, which all create a sense of happiness, community, and social opportunity (Babin & Harris, 2016). This seems to justify its shortcomings of utilitarian value (Babin & Harris, 2016). While this house provides us a roof over our heads, that’s its biggest commodity. Its coin-operated laundry that refuses to dry a load in less than two runs, chronically muggy basement, upstairs shower that will leave you shivering unless you find the sweet spot on the dial, the dishwasher that won’t stay shut, the giant hole in the dining room floor, and the scary groutfit-wearing landlord who only will speak via short cryptic emails do not provide the value many people seek. For some reason, we shirk these attributes that create low economic and functional value and pay attention only to the social and experiential value we receive from our sweet, beige house (Gupta, 2014). Such is life on Greenwood.

Greenwood Block Party

We began calling ourselves the Vortex due to our random mix of eight girls and derelict living situation that seemed eerily similar to the one portrayed in Sydney White. We all joined together while signing our lease with one goal: to have some good, weird fun for our senior year. Meet the tenants below;

Claire E: Lives in the basement, has at least 30 plants. Unsure if she lives in a bedroom or a greenhouse. Lover of red wine and makeup tutorials.

Mado: Rock climber extraordinaire. Recently ran an ultra marathon (50 miles). Also, recently has been making ceramic heads in her bedroom. Also a basement dweller.

Claire B: Has a great LinkedIn. Makes amazing chocolate chip cookies. Still doesn’t have a shelf to put her groceries on. The third and final member of the basement.

Roxy: Loves winter sports. Dream job is working for Red Bull, no position, just Red Bull. Has red hair but “isn’t a ginger.” Lives on the middle floor with an adjoining door to my bedroom.

Nicole: Avid moped rider. Threw a house party inspired by her celibacy. Convinced her mom all her Rick’s Café charges were for lunch and not mind probes. Also lives on the middle floor.

Rachel: Creative Writing concentrator that is always reading, writing, drinking tea, or watching Spongebob. Sneezes 30 times daily because she lives in the incredibly dusty attic.

Taylor: Also lives in the attic. Didn’t know Rachel very well before moving in together. Has 3 jobs, is constantly getting rejected from bars, but arguably keeps her life more put together than else in the house.

And then there’s me, Libby, your guide through the Vortex blog. I’m glad you’ve made it this far. Now that you’ve gotten to know the Vortex, stay tuned for my future posts where I dive into making and breaking trends within the house and manipulating my friends.

References

Babin, B. J., & Harris, E. G. (2016). CB7. Boston, MA: Cengage Learning. 

Gupta, S. (2014). Marketing Reading: Creating Customer Value. Cambridge, MA: Harvard Business School Publishing Corporation. Retrieved October 3, 2017.

Robinson, J. (Producer), & Nussbaum, J. (Director). (2007). Sydney White [Motion Picture]. United States: Universal Pictures.

Video link: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=i5NEJDQUme4

Block party photo via Greenwood Block Party 2017 Facebook Event, no longer existing.