I've live at home in two separate stints since graduating from college. The first kept me afloat for a few months during the beginning of my Americorps year, the second was a temporary arrangement spanning a move back to Milwaukee from one good job to another.
Moving back with my mother meant a pretty cramped house each time. During the first, I straight up couldn't afford to move anywhere until I saved up a little money. The second time, I could have afforded, and probably should have found something on my own off the bat.
However, something called me home. It was the same little dinging, warm feeling I got when I'd hop on the Badger Bus for a weekend back home when I was at school in Madison. It was the thrill I got when I took to the highway back from Green Bay during my dark days fighting evil there.
The promise of that sustained thrill and the satisfaction of that yearning to head home combined to an irresistible draw during that second stretch.
I had enough of my own shit to create an environment very much my own in my mother's house. I enjoyed cooking in her kitchen. Not paying her rent gave me financial freedom to that point unrivaled in my experience. Under it all, there was a sense of comfort and belonging that I only feel, to this day, when I'm there.
A few of my other friends were living at home, too. It was the summer. A few of us were talking about taking the leap back out - but I was unconvinced.
One night, sitting on my mother's couch, one of my favorites in the world - and many times decorated with the kind of drool that I issue only during the finest naps - Mama put it like this:
" I love you, Steve, but something about my 25 year old son, with a good job, living at home, smacks of failure."
I moved out about a week later.
The yearning to go home has never gone away. The financial draw is clear, even if I paid rent to my mom, I'd save money, and be better able to address the lingering sting of my credit card debt, which will be the subject of another post. With us twentysomethings, it's not that we can't live on our own. No, we can live on our own in comfort and style. We like kitting out our independent lifestyles and carving out environments for ourselves, friends, and pets to enjoy.
But still, we want to go home. Is the feeling of home so precious? It's something (the whole concept of home, I mean) that I think humans create with such vigor that it has to make an impression on us. For me, and many people I know, it was positive. Was it because our subconsciousness and memories are so sprinkled with the fuzzies from the new parenting techniques that moms and dads used on us? Is it that our generation is destined to never find ways truly our own?
What do you think?
Shit, Italians live with their moms forever.....
