I've never kept "normal" hours. I'm a night person, in the extreme. It is not unusual for me to be up until 3 a.m. My parents told me that even as an infant, I'd sleep all day and stay up all night.

I don't adhere to ordinary meal times, either. Sure, if I'm meeting someone for lunch or dinner, I'm happy to do so at a customary time. On my own, though, it's different.

I work at home most of the time and I like to wear sweats. If I'm reading for fun, I like to be sprawled out on the living room couch.

When I'm answering e-mails, cooking, puttering around, or doing other stuff that does not take up all of my mental space, I often like to have the TV on in the background.

None of that is terribly embarrassing, I don't think, and anyway I just posted it on this blog that anyone with access to the internet can read. And yet, when I try to figure out what it is that I love so very much about living alone, I think it is, in part, the sense of not being monitored and not being judged.