Posting from the sanctuary of my car. Current time is 11:45 pm EST. Night is calm, pleasantly warm for January in the Great Lakes region.

Background. After several failed attempts of living on my own, I moved back in with my parents. My "rent" is about $500 a month to appease my mother, but I've discovered that for somebody that cares more about money than anything else, she's really bad at keeping track of it. So I've been slowly sneaking away extra money into my savings account all year. Currently at $4,000 after being flat broke and homeless a year ago.

My biggest mistake before was I never had enough of a financial cushion to get started, and wound up in unstainable and miserable situations because I was forced to take the first job that came up. $1,000 savings isn't enough to start living on your own comfortably when that isn't even enough for your first rent plus security deposit.

I don't have a hard date set, pretty much however much longer I can stand this job. If I can make it to the end of summer I could probably have close to $10,000 saved by then. I think that'll be enough to quit my job and bail on everything then go live wherever the fuck I want, though a part of me thinks it's almost time now.