I got an email from a friend who mentioned that his grown kids living at home were on notice because he and his wife were moving to senior housing in 3 years. This got me to thinking how current economic and social realities had grown kids staying at home even longer. It also reminded me of a conversation from when Jean and I were in grad school.
One day Mary, one of the students in our psych class, arrived simply beaming. She was a slender nurse in her late 40s who we had enjoyed visiting with. When we asked what she was so excited about, she said her last child had just moved out and was setting up housekeeping on their own. She was thrilled that her life, and her home would be her own again.
The discussion continued about getting started on your own and kids moving on until someone asked Mary, "What will you do when they move back?" It was fascinating to watch the emotions play across Mary's face as she processed her memories of friend's children moving home. It was clear she had never thought of it.
I stayed with my parents for a few weeks when I got out of the navy. My brother, sister and I came home for a while when we each divorced, so even the baby boomers used their folks' house as a port in a storm.
In areas like New York, LA and San Francisco it is so incredibly expensive to set up housekeeping and its no cake walk in the rest of the country, so many kids were staying home longer.
I remember when I went was stationed in Maine in the late 60's I encountered a pattern among some families. Kids lived with their parents until they married. When they married, another bedroom was built onto the house and that's where the new couple lived. I found out about this when I asked some of the locals in Lewiston about these houses with extra wings and stories added on.
Posted by apopheniac at October 15, 2004 10:44 AM