How we got to where we are now

I think the most important start of any story is the beginning, it allows for everything else to happen, because it explains how we arrived at the point that we are currently looking at. So here is our beginning.
Once upon a time, like two months ago, my boyfriend, we will call him Alan, and I decided that we wanted to move in together. Alan and I, at the time, had been together for a little under a year, but had known each other for five, and as I had just graduated from college and was living with family for the first time in four years, I knew that this was the right step for us. As we made our decision, we told our families about our plan; his family was very supportive of the situation and encouraged us, my family on the other hand was a little less encouraging, in fact I am pretty sure that if I wasn't 22 years old and a college graduate they would have disowned me. (Now here's where I am going to add my little words of wisdom)
Even though my family was less than encouraging when it came to Alan and I moving in together, and even though I spent a lot of time dealing with them asking me if this was what I was sure I wanted to do, and hearing them tell me that I was doing an unchristian thing (I vaguely remember one of them telling me that I was going to be living in sin). I don't regret telling them that we were moving in together, in fact I almost wish I had told them that we were planning this sooner than I did because I think it would have made life easier for everyone involved. I honestly do believe that it was hard for my parents to hear that I was going to be moving in with my boyfriend, and while my parents are less than perfect, I believe that they want the best for me and I think that my decision to move in with Alan worried them because if something were to happen between us, we might be stuck in a situation where not only would one of us be hurt emotionally but at the same time ruin us financially.

Yet, even though we didn't have the support of my family, we decided to continue on with what we thought was the best next step for our relationship. After a little searching we found an apartment that we loved, it was in an apartment complex in which a couple of our friends lived in, it was close to my job that I will be starting in September, it was close to his school, his family, his work, and in general close to things that make life easier, there is a Wal-Mart down the road, a mall, lots of good take-out and the highway isn't all that far away, and while it may not have been perfect, because nothing ever is, it was the right place for us. With in three weeks of us finding our apartment Alan and I were moving in. When we first moved in we didn't have a whole lot of furniture, most of my furniture was at my mother's house which was over four hours away. In fact the only furniture we had at the time was a love seat two black tables from Wal-Mart, a TV, an air mattress, and a night stand. We lived like that for two weeks. In all honesty it wasn't that bad living with very little, in fact sometimes I miss it, there was a lot less to clean, there was more to vacuum, but less to dust, and wipe and all the other things that I do to keep the place clean.
Since we moved into our own place in the middle of July, Alan and I have made a lot of changes to our place. To begin with we have a lot more furniture, not all of the things that we want but enough for right now, and enough for our 2 bedroom 1 bathroom.

We have had a housewarming party, and that was an adventure in itself, which I will save for another post, and we have learned a lot about each other along the way, again something for another post. But what I will say as I finally wrap up our beginning, moving in with someone is an adventure in itself, it is a challenge that teaches you a lot about yourself, about what you are willing to change and about what you won't change. From the start it teaches you how much of someone you can handle and how much time you need to yourself. It teaches you that the most important thing is to listen and to compromise, and to write things down. But most importantly it teaches you that yes growing up can suck (BILLS SUCK) but at the same time growing up leads to the ability to come home to a hug from someone you love. So yes, I grew up for this.

One question

Over the past few years I have been toying with the idea of starting a blog, but I was never really able to come up with an idea for a topic. Over the past few years I have come up with a few ideas here and there, but they weren't things that I felt I could run with, but more importantly I didn't feel these ideas were things that might help anyone. And helping others is something that I felt was extremely important. It wasn't until I graduated from college in May and then moved in with my boyfriend in July, that I realized that life itself is the best thing to write about. It's the ups and downs, the hardships, the moments when all you want to do cry but at the same time you can't help but laugh because there is nothing else you can do, and its the learning not only about yourself but about what you can handle. I started writing because honestly, I wish someone had told me how hard being a grown up could be. I mean don't get me wrong, I knew that life wasn't going to be easy, in fact I believe that if life is easy one of two things is happening either you're doing something wrong or you better watch out because this is the calm before the storm. I knew the basics about being on your own and growing up; I knew about the bills, cleaning my own place without small children who have to do chores to help, constantly having things to do to keep up with things, and then all the other little things that like to pop up when it is the worst possible time. But my mom had spent so much time making such things look easy that when I had to start doing it for myself I got a rude shock. When I think about it I knew what it was going to be like to have a roommate because I had roommates and suite mates in college, but I guess I just didn't realize what it would be like to not have a roommate per say, someone who I could shut the door on if they got on my nerves, but instead to have a housemate, someone I shared a space with and no matter what I could never really get away from. This someone is a person I wake up to, come home to, watch leave, and just in general share a complete and total space and life with. Now that I have a little taste of what it is like to be a grown up all I have to wonder is: I grew up for this?