Making the Decision to Live at Home

So a big decision has been made. After months of job searching, soul searching, and financial analyses, I have made the decision to live at home with my parents until I go to law school. This choice brings my job search back to the Baltimore radius, but I think it may have its benefits. I have more connections and contacts here. My "who you know" is definitely more extensive here than anywhere else, so hopefully that means that I'll be offered a job at a place that suits my needs sometime soon. (I'm using every fiber of my being to optimistic. It's hard out here.)

I've been going back and forth about the benefits of living at home or trying to find employment elsewhere for some time now. I've talked to my parents, other family, and friends to get their advice. I've made numerous pros and cons lists. I have genuinely attempted to peer down into the depths of my soul to see what I truly wanted.

After a fight I had with my mother (classic, and I guess will become even more classic for the next couple years) we had a productive talk about, well, my life. We discussed the main reason I didn't want to live at home: lack of independence. As it stands now, I share a wall with my parents. It takes to long to get to places from our house that your typical 22 year old would want to visit. I am jobless, therefore essentially penniless, so if I want something that is not already in my home I have to ask my parents to buy it for me.

These are just not the conditions I wanted to experience after college. But my mother so wisely reminded me that these conditions are not permanent. They're temporary until I have a job. Then, I will be able to finally feel like I have more control in my life. I'll be able to start paying off my student loans, get a car, prepare for putting myself through law school, and be able to do things with my friends again like I used to and not turn down trips to the aquarium because I can't afford it (real life struggles).

The most economically pressing items in that list are student loans from undergraduate school and the future student loans I will accrue while attending law school. When I took a look at the thousands and thousands of dollars my education has and will cost me, it was clear that spending money on an apartment, groceries, wifi, and other things of that nature just wasn't the best idea.

It's true some of my friends have made the leap of living on their own, and I definitely envy their independence and gusto, however, each situation is different. Not all of my friends have student loans. Not all of my friends are planning to put themselves through law school in the near future. So it was important that I took a step back and stopped comparing my life to other people's and really focused on what would be best for me.

I also thought about the fact that a lot of people in their early 20's perfect the art of scraping by and miraculously managing to make ends meet. Not only can I not stomach the thought of being that destitute after being AmeriCorps and living life below the poverty line, but I know that that caliber of a hard time is guaranteed to be ahead me when I finance my way through law school. It seems the best option is to save money so that the me of a few years from now can look back and thank the current me for making the decision to be fiscally responsible in exchange for some personal liberties.

Now that I've fully committed to being at home, I can stop treating my time here as a transitional period and really settle in. I started to redecorate my room when I first came back from AmeriCorps but I stopped because I kept telling myself that I wouldn't be here for long so it didn't matter. But now I've joined the gym with my mother, and I'll be taking over most of the grocery shopping, so I can be in charge of getting my family's health back on track, which is something that I'm really excited about. So even though I still want to explore and experience living long term in another city that isn't Baltimore, I still have those options ahead of me. I don't know where law school will take me, so that's an adventure that I can look forward to. For now, I'm going to put my best foot forward and try to capitalize on my home field advantage.

P.S. My parents are trying to play it cool, but they are ridiculously ecstatic. I told y'all, they sweat me, haha.

Leaving People Behind

Today I thought I'd write about leaving friends and family behind. Unlike the majority of my best friends from high school, I stayed home in good ole' Balty for college. I initially had no intention of staying in my hometown for college but I didn't want to pass up the opportunity to go to Johns Hopkins, and I'm glad I didn't. I met some of the best people I know there, who have definitely helped shape my life, so I definitely don't regret my decision.

But now college is over, and most of my high school best friends are back. So, not only do I have those people here, but also most of my best friends from college. They're either finishing up senior year, working in Baltimore, or working in DC. On top of that, my parents are here, in the home I grew up in, along with a big part of my extended family. That being said, I have a large network of support in the Baltimore/DC area, so I guess I shouldn't be too surprised when people don't understand why I would want to live elsewhere. 

Two of my little cousins that I get see almost every week! So much cuteness.

The thing is, I never got to leave. I never got to experience that independence, which is weird for me, because in general I am a very independent person. I like to do things on my own just to prove to myself that I can. When I was little, I didn't like my parents to help me with my homework because I wanted to be a big girl and do it by myself. We're talking "draw the shapes" homework a la kindergarten '96. But that's when it started, and I'm still the same way. 

Even though I loved my experience at Hopkins, I did always envy my friends who got to experience living in a different city. They got to know a different culture and way of life. Technically, I did too, because Hopkins is definitely its own entity. Hopkins' Baltimore and the Baltimore I grew up in are two different spheres, but the fact remained, my house was 15 minutes away and my high school was 9. 

Some of my girls from college =)

I think having my mother as the voice of my subconscious (terrifying, but true) is enough for me to take some time living away from my parents. My mother would be all too happy if I landed a job in DC or Baltimore just in case I "need her." I think that kind of proximity will be an important function of our relationship later in our lives, when either of us are at a point of needing true assistance (when I have kids or perhaps she actually starts to get old), but for now I think it's okay for us to be separate when we're both highly functional haha. Also, New York is a 3.5 hour drive, so really, I'm not aiming to go that far away. 

By moving to New York, I would be leaving behind my high school best friends, some of my best friends from college and my family, but I would also have a chance to build on relationship with my friends who already live in New York. I think that is an important part of me making a transition there because I already have friends there to make it a little bit easier. 

But still, it's going to be hard. I had lots of "fear of missing out" when I was in AmeriCorps, but I think that was severely amplified by the fact that I was having the worst time of my life haha. Also, most of my best friends from high school are not just that. I've known them since I was 6 years old and we went to school together for the majority of our lives, so we have a closeness that is untouchable. And my dear friends from college, we got really close, really fast. They were there as I transitioned from teenager to adult, so one could say that's pretty important. I'm in no way going to let these relationships go due to any geographical differences. 

My chicks from 1st grade on.

In high school I'd see my friends 5 days a week for a least a few hours a day. In college, my friends lived within a 10 block radius. And now things are different all over again. One of my best friends whose room was right below mine in college is now living in Haiti. And such is life, situations and opportunities change, and you've just gotta roll with it. You have to trust that the relationships and bonds you've established with people can survive at any distance. You might not have the same type of relationship you had in college or high school, but if you are true friends, whenever you get together, you'll be able to pick up right where you left off.