Well, it finally happened. Nearly a year after I moved back home to Texas, I’ve left my mom’s house for a place of my own.

There were no moving trucks and no tears — I had only brought a bedroom full of stuff and to be honest, I think they were ready to be rid of me.

Until a few weeks ago I had sworn I’d never live alone. Just the thought of it gave me attention seeker’s anxiety. Who would I talk to when I got home? Do you just spend those hours between work and bedtime silent? What if something totally amazeballs happened in life or online and I needed to share it with someone RIGHT THEN?

What if (as once happened to me in college) I fell out of the shower while contorting myself to shave and momentarily lost consciousness??

I’ve never lived alone before. I’d lived with my parents in a tiny duplex, shared rooms with my sisters — and, even when I got my own, shared at least a bathroom and a wall. In college I lived in the dorms with a roommate (two, actually; the first had to be reassigned, but that’s a story for another time).

Then I lived in my sorority house with more people than ever. There, bathrooms became communal (as did closets), I found myself back on the top bunk and I was scrambling once again to make it on time to family-style dinner lest I go hungry.

So I was a bit anxious to claim my new garage apartment. I live above an artist’s studio just five blocks from my family, and even though I can jog there without breaking a sweat, it’s a world apart. It’s not quite as Pottery Barn as I’d always imagined (interrupted by my own quirky knickknacks and out-there screen prints, of course), but it’s totes adorbs.

The stairs and long hallway up to door are sea foamy green, and you just can’t be in a bad mood walking through it. My tiny kitchen has a little gas range and a littler fridge, and even though it’s been noted that the bathroom is a bit outdated, the retro pastel tiling and wall-recessed space heater are hard not to adore. I’ve got hardwood floors, bigger closets than I did at home and French doors that open to a deck overlooking the backyard.

I love taking my two reusable grocery bags to the store alone every week instead of taking a moving van to Costco every month. I love being naked whenever and wherever I please (my sibs are such prudes). I love having the place as quiet or as screaming loud as I want, depending on whether I need to decompress or dance it out.

But what I love most is that everything is always exactly where I left it. It’s all mine, and I don’t have to let anyone in if I don’t want to.

I do want to, though. Come by for poolside margaritas anytime. Just call first.