Empty Nest Syndrome

The word family means something different in India. Coming from a world where 90% of my friends move out of the house within months of turning 18, the idea of living with your parents when you're thirty is laughable. Here, it's bizzare to live in your own house unless you're married. At first I thanked God to be born in America because the idea of living with my parents until I get married seemed, in a word, horrifying. I've been wanting to move out of the house since as a long as I can remember. In Middle School, I begged to go to bording school. I've always wanted out.

Now, though, I'm beginning to look at the whole situation differently. I leave for Lucknow and Shabri Aunty in about an hour. I won't see my parents for almost four months. Last June, I would probably have celebrated this fact, but right now I'm actually pretty sad. Something weird happened over the past two weeks- we had fun.
Together.
As a "family."
On Vacation.

In India, a person's family is her friends. Aunts and inlaws call more than once a day to see what's up and it's not unusual for a 93 year old grand uncle to drive 4 hours to visit some random niece he's never met. No, I don't laugh as much as when I'm home. No, I don't go out or have horribly engaging converstaions very often. But in an age where entire relationships can be terminated by changing your facebook status, it's nice to be around people whose bond isn't imature humor or shared passing interests, but blood.

And when you grow up here, I can see how living with your parents could be not as horrifying as I thought. I think that people in America just never reach a point where they are both their parents friends and roommates. Ages 12-20 usually aren't prime parent-child bonding years anyway, right?
Not that i plan on living with my parents, or anything/