On Being the Prodigal (But Cranky) Daughter

In the past few days two of my fellow 'Nova alumnae (how ya like that?) have posted about the plight of the graduated student come home. To stay. Indefinitely. Since we Villanovans are all about community (you know, with Habitat houses, honors interdisciplinary mind-effs, toothbrushes, and the like), I thought I'd add to the discussion. Because I, too, am living at home. And I can't say I know exactly when that will no longer be the case.

Now we all know the beginning to this story. Post-college life has become the second childhood... our pockets have been eaten alive by vulturous college-kid-hunting credit card companies ... the recession has not yet been Obama'd ... blah blah (not to mention the three of us have chosen career paths in media and not accounting, ahem). And so here we are, in our childhood beds with our softball All-star team trophies still looking right at us like they did when we were 12.

I'm not going to lie. In a lot of ways I love being able to pretend I'm that little kid for a little while longer. I love that my mom does my laundry, that my dad occasionally puts gas in my car, and that dinner is often made for me when I'm home. I love feeling comfortable and safe in the only house I've really known for longer than 9 months at a time. I love that I can spend Saturday mornings watching TV, or going to the gym, or hanging out with the boyfriend, because hey! you don't really have errands to run when you don't have your own place!

But then the bubble pops (and here's where this blog post gets dangerous since I've up until now erred on the side of not talking about specific people, because, heh - they might read it). Mom puts your clothes just where she likes them, how she likes them. Dad messes with your car radio, cleans out the backseat and moves everything where he'll never remember it is. Dinners are calorie-conscious disasters, every night is family movie night, and suddenly you're being scheduled for things just like you were before you passed your drivers test ("Well next weekend we've got the garage sale you'll have to help at, and the following evening we're taking Grandma to see a show ...")

And then there's just the constant surveillance. The questions. The looking. The hovering. I know it's horrible of me to say anything like this about the woman who gave me life and feeds me dinner every night, but if my mother even so much as looks at me the wrong way, I'm irrationally raving. You're never alone. Not by yourself. Not with your friends. Not with your boyfriend. Not out on a blissfully free coffee run when you bump into that weird chess-playing kid/buzz-cutted jock/prom queen-become-townie you went to high school with. Not ever.

I've just reread what I've written so far and all I can think of now is, WHAT AM I SUPPOSED TO DO? I can't move, and frankly I don't want even want to yet. But I can't stay and I certainly don't want to retreat back to the person I was before I became the independent woman ("throw your hands up at me...") I was in college, often alone and often liking it (other times not so much... but you've heard enough about that already).

I can't believe I'm already using the phrase, I was in college; I went to Villanova. Who am I supposed to be now, in the in-between? Or even after that? And when will my mother stop smiling at me??