“Dependence Day”
Published in Details, August 1997.
It was a perfectly reasoned decision at the time.
I was 28, broke, a reporter at a small newspaper in rural California with no chance of moving up. I weighed my options: I could stay there, in a beautiful part of the country, and eke out a meager living — deferring my student loans and accruing interest all the while. I could try to make a go of it in San Francisco — a cool city, sure, but an expensive one,and since I wasn’t shaved, pierced, scarred, tattooed, or bisexual, I figured I might have a tough time getting started. One last option seemed like it might be painful, but it was the most logical: low rent, a place I knew, friends and family in the area.
So I headed home to Evanston, a suburb of Chicago, and moved in with my parents.