This is mostly a blog post about living in my own filth and fruit flies.

Here are 25 things I’ve realized after living on my own for 10 months:

1. You truly realize how many cups/mugs you use when you don’t own a dishwasher.
2. It doesn’t take much for the kitchen garbage to stink up a one bedroom apartment.
3. I appreciate my parents 400% more. They are amazing people that put with my bullshit, remained kind during my overtired bouts of anger and did my laundry through CreComm.
4. My relationship with my mother is completely different and better. I am thankful.
5. Everything in the organic aisle is f*cking expensive.
6. I completely rearranged my furniture three times, a few months apart, to get it to a place where I’m pretty happy with it. My apartment is always a work in progress, and I like it that way.
7. Just because my house is dirty for 15 days straight doesn’t make me a bad or irresponsible person. It just means I have priorities, and cleaning *~oBvIOUSLyyy~* isn’t one of them.
8. Money spent on food and drinks with friends is $$ well spent. Quality time spent with friends is an investment.
9. My apartment doesn’t look like something off Pinterest, and that’s ok. Nobody expects it to.
10. Two decorative items that are good for the soul: photos of friends, family and good times, and plants.
11. Having a $300 marble coffee table is nice for Instagram photos, but it will lose it’s novelty quickly. Spending $300 on a spontaneous weekend getaway — now that is something you’ll treasure.
12. Instead of making me feel more connected, my phone often makes me feel more isolated, lonely and anxious (especially when I’m supposed to be enjoying a relaxing night in). Put it in another room and leave it there.
13. LEAVE THE HOUSE AT LEAST ONCE A DAY. I think I need to tattoo this on my forehead because I never seem to listen to my own advice…almost every time I stay inside all day, I end up binge eating, crying and/or staying up wayyyyy too late watching Netflix.
14. Just because there’s wine in the fridge doesn’t mean I need to drink it.
15. I know exactly what I need to do to cheer myself up when I’m blue — the hard part is getting of the couch without anyone telling me to, and doing it.
16. There are times to spend Saturday inside cleaning my apartment, and there are also opportunities to go to the beach. I believe life is better with a bit of both.
17. There is no right or wrong way to be an “adult”.
18. Bread from an actual bakery is 450% better.
19. Buy. A. Drain. Clog.
20. I eat way less food than I thought. RE: why do I keep buying family size containers of mixed greens???? It takes me like 3 weeks to eat a dozen eggs…
21. People give me shit about not owning a car. Hey, I might show up to meetings  sweaty, but at least I walk about 10,000 steps a day.
22. If I don’t bring junk food into the house, 8 times out of 10 I won’t go out of my way to go get it.
23. Generally, landlords will try to get away with as much as possible (at least mine does). Call them on it. Call the company. Make a scene. You deserve to live in a clean, up-to-code apartment and feel safe in your building  — even if your rent is less than $700 a month.
24. Shout out to single parent’s everywhere: taking care of a house by yourself is a lot of work. I can’t imagine what it’s like to also have to take care of a family/child too, all on your own. Y’all deserve some recognition.
25. Don’t move into an three-story walk-up without air conditioning unless you enjoy putting your sheets in the freezer and sleeping with ice packs in your bed.

— RJH