Whether you are alone for the night, alone for the weekend, or alone for an hour, the story is pretty much the same. An empty house is an invitation to us all to confront our very real fear of ghosts, our destiny as a star with the voice of the angels, or our inevitability of becoming an internet recluse.

Teenagers of less repute than I take advantage of the solace to –dare I mention—fire up the Internet and search sites blocked by the school’s foolproof firewall, sites like Huffington Post and scandalous things ending in .blogspot.com, sites where we may see such scintillating things as liberally biased news articles and a catalogue of cat funnies. Personally, my reality is more like unhealthy binge sessions of Netflix. Time has little meaning when home with oneself and one self’s computer. The guilt of watching your mother clean for five hours straight whilst you lounge on the couch is also nonexistent with the convenient state of emptiness experiences when home alone. You can proudly watch animated movie after animated movie without wanted to justify your actions as ‘productive’ or ‘not going to slowing commit genocide with my brain cells’.

On a separate note, hard wood floors are, quite possibly, the single most entertaining invention in the entire world. Add a pair of socks, a couple of hours, and an empty house and they are the most entertaining invention in the entire galaxy. Being home alone, with a silver spoon as a microphone, forces us to reminisce about our early dreams of stardom. We pretend like we got over notion that being a rock star is our primarily desired career option, but when no one is looking, our actions speak otherwise. The need to sing may not be as strong in some of us; sure, you may ask how a 5 foot, suburban, white girl can possess a Whitney Housten-esque voice, but the combination of the acoustics of my empty kitchen and the Want to Dance With Somebod-ay are empirically unarguable. I’m not saying we all slide around in thick socks and flannel shirts belting out the entirety of the lyrics, guitar riffs, and synthesized effects, but when Rick Springfield comes on, one simply cannot sit idly by when surrounded by an empty home.

Aside from the fun of the Alone Edition of American Idol, toward the end of the night, the reality of being alone is realized. Don’t kid yourself. None of us have fully recovered from the childhood fear of the dark. We may nearly be adults, but that doesn’t stop us from death sprinting up the stairs the moment our finger leaves the off-switch on light or from dramatically snatching the shower curtain away from an empty wall, just to reassure ourselves no serial killers are creeping with Rubber Ducky. Being home alone at night is when “maybe they are creatures of the night” becomes a viable explanation for the shadows lurking behind every kitchen cabinet. In addition to our overactive imagination, there is a need—an urge. An unconquerable desire to pursue, watch, listen, read, participate in that accursed genre so named horror. Obviously, this primeval want doesn’t rank on the Top Ten List of Wise Things I’ve Accomplished When I’m Alone, but for some reason the only time I’ve ever had an inclination to watch Poltergeist is immediately after the sun sets on my empty home. Personally, I tend to favor loud, boring infomercials to drown out the blatant silence that signals the sentries of Satan’s approach.