The sunset of freedom will soon be upon many, and English major Debbie Kraus is well aware of this. She is moving into her parents’ basement office at semester’s end.

Many of you will go to your parents’ home to spend the summer leaving the free spirit of college life behind. No more drinking all night and passing out in your bathroom. No more screaming from your balcony. No more staying up all night looking at Internet porn and hoping your roommate doesn’t wake up. Instead of your roommate, your parents will be waking up and telling you to clean your room, get out of bed and get a job.

I will not be going back to my parents’ this summer, and I couldn’t be happier. Most of DeKalb slows down in the summer, and there’s little traffic, little noise and the B.O. of people who shower once a semester goes away. It can be boring at times, but I will take that over living with my parents.

It’s not that I don’t like my parents. I just remember a few embarrassing moments I’d rather not relive. Does anyone recall watching a PG-13 or R-rated movie with your parents and having a sexual or nude scene come on? I remember it all too well, and the awkwardness that goes with it; especially when your father becomes noticeably aroused by the situation on the television.

Thankfully, I don’t have to worry about that problem anymore. My father had a series of elaborate surgeries and afterwards was, shall we say, a changed man. He was kind enough to share his tales of impotence with me while I was driving him to the doctor. I didn’t want to hear about it, but I suppose he thought we could bond.

But having this knowledge may be better than the worry of coming home and having my parents … engaged. I am uncertain if anyone else assumes their parents conceived them through scientific, non-sexual means, but I know I don’t like thinking of my parents “doing the nasty.”

I am also fairly certain they don’t want to think about their children “taking one-eye to the optometrist” either. A few summers ago at home, my friend Matt and I were watching tennis on the television. We watched and commented with my mother sitting next to us. It was no big deal until a commercial break came on. It was very odd to watch a “Girls Gone Wild” commercial with my own mother. We sat in silence not looking at the television, but not really looking away. We immediately started talking about the next commercial when the torture ended.

Perhaps I was not so much a victim of having freedoms taken away as I was a victim of having my parents inflict their freedom on me. Which is still better than living in the basement office of their house, sorry Debbie.