Stuck At Home
Recently I read an interesting article on MSN entitled “How to Date When You Live With Your Parents.” *
I read something in it by a dude named “Joel” who was identified as being 26 and stuck back home for three years after a job layoff. This part especially caught my eye:
"I haven't had any of those weird, embarrassing moments where I tell a new girl I live with my parents and she flips out…because I'm too nervous to even bring it up until I get to know someone a little better. Whenever I do tell a woman I'm seeing, I'm sure none of them are crazy about it, but I think they don't want me to feel bad, so they've never said anything."
I can identify with the “ … I’m too nervous to even bring it up until I get to know someone a little better.” part because I used to feel that way myself, having lived with the family unit since I was born. Only during a few days in July, 1997, and two nights and one day in 2010 have I lived “on my own”, even though it was at home. The reason why is not because I am a clueless stereotypical dweeb but because –to be as blunt as General Patton (yes, Patton), my father was a real asshole who caused nothing but chaos in my family. Chaos which always targeted money to the point he left us destitute ten years ago living in our car with one dollar to our name, which in turn meant my brother and I had to work our tails off helping rebuild our lives (mom has a bad back and can’t work). The gory details belong not here but at the Feo and Anomalies blogs **, but the above is the gist as to why, at 31, I am stuck at home. And I don’t give a damn anymore if every single woman in the world knew it. (Come to think of it, they do now know that. This is the “World wide web”, after all!)
Regardless of why I’m here, though, I am in good company, because the same MSN article claims that:
“Faced with rising rents, school loans to pay off and a tight job market, more and more adults are moving back home with their parents—about 18 million between the ages of 18 and 34, according to the US Census Bureau.”
Nevertheless, I am bored to death with living at home, so bored I am absent half the time being a man about town. No disrespect to my mom, brother, and pet terrier mix, however: they’re super sweet and understanding of my restlessness and personal quirks. In fact, mom lets me have all the personal time I want, bless her soul.
But again, I am absolutely bored (and fed up) with the situation, especially when “home” is a two-bedroom apartment so crammed with stuff you have to watch your step located (mercifully) in a small apartment building. I swear to God, I love the above named close members of the family; but the day oodles of money finally comes allowing me to get the hell out of here at last can’t come soon enough.
Oh yes: the MSN article asked those who responded what their most embarrassing moment was. Well, I’ve got a ton of them, and they all involve how there are three other single men in my building –one of whom is “living at home” himself right below me- and all I can do is stew in my juices and wish, wish, wish I had A. a girlfriend of my own and B. my own place to take them to each and every time those other dudes in my building have their girls over...
I swear, I’m going to get my own place as soon as it’s feasible.