The other night, I watched Frances Ha, the most recent Noah Baumbach film about a twenty-something girl in New York. Her crowning moment in the movie is when, for the first time in years, she is able to afford her own apartment. Perhaps it's because I'm amazed by the simple things (admittedly, I am still blown away by how good ice water tastes) but I'm with Frances: living on your own is a pinnacle life experience, one deserving of a cinematic ending.

I am twenty-three, a Boomerang kid as the New York Times puts it, and subscribe to the outlook that Adam Davidson suggests somewhere in the piece that "sleeping in a twin bed under some old Avril Lavigne posters is not a sign of giving up; it's an economic plan."

Economically, I have had plenty of advantages and with those blessings, I have been able to study in Spain, even forgo a salary for a year and live frugally in Central America. The travel has broadened me, which helps now because I feel shameless in the fact that I am in my twenties and living at home. Friends in Spain lived with their families in flats; I never walked into a house in Honduras where three generations weren't sitting around the cable TV.

There are down sides to living at home though; one being that it took me two train rides and a mile walk to get to Lake Michigan for the Fourth of July fireworks. But when I finally got there and watched the array of fireworks amidst the Chicago skyline, it all looked pretty majestic. 

I really couldn't complain.