By Jonathan Abbott and Allison Moore

It’s no secret: sometimes life can be rough! When you’re staring at your tear-stained reflection in the bathroom mirror during your fifth emotional breakdown in one week, sometimes you start to think to yourself, “Why shouldn’t I just throw it all away and start over somewhere new, selling tacky jewelry to tourists in a random town in Ohio or whatever?” The answer is you should absolutely do that, and there’s no reason not to. Therapists are hacks and sellouts. Here’s our top 35 reasons to say “fuck it” to college debt and embrace life on the road!

1. There’s no time like the present! Take a leap of faith and make some great memories!
2. Without practice, your driving skills will get rusty.
3. A ton of students are already taking gap years due to Coronavirus. Why not make the most of a bad situation and see the world?
4. You’ve been meaning to listen to those meditation podcasts that your friend Mackkynziegh, the one with the vegan eggnog recipe blog, keeps sending you, right?. Well, you’ll have plenty of time for that while stuck in traffic.
5. The over-glorification of van life needs to be exposed on a broader social media platform. You could become one of those #woke influencers that just posts about how much influencer culture sucks! That way you’re cool AND meta at the same time.
6. Did you really plan on finishing college? You know, a ton of super smart people never got their degrees, like Steve Jobs and maybe some other guy. Maybe you’re just a free spirit, and higher education isn’t really your “thing.”
7. Nothing is more emotionally cleansing than road rage. Scream at that driver the way you wish you could have screamed at your last boyfriend when he sold your pet chinchilla to buy Neutral Milk Hotel concert tickets. Anyone can scream! But apparently you can’t signal, Grandma.
8. Therapy is for normies. Why would you want to tell your problems to some middle aged loser with a psych degree when you could tell them to a cool middle aged guy at a truck stop? Marriage is cool and adult, but love is fake. As long as you refuse to commit to anyone or anything, you can’t have your heart broken! 
9. In the American road sex comedy film, Road Trip (2000),  Josh Parker (Breckin Meyer) accidentally mails an illicit tape of himself sleeping with another woman  to his long distance girlfriend, Tiffany Henderson (Rachel Blanchard). Doesn’t that remind you of your last boyfriend?
10. This time alone will really give you time to, like, introspect and get in touch with your soul.
11. One time at a therapy session I just lay on the floor and recited poetry from memory for a full hour.
12. You stalked your ex’s Facebook and found out they have a hot new significant other. Show them what they’ve lost by proving you’re cool and worldly. Only losers go Facebook official anyway… they’re just Zuckerberg’s pawns, and you’re off the grid.
13. Everyone loves a fun week in Vegas! That’s probably where the new wedding ring on your finger came from, but honestly, who knows? Only the courthouse. And God.
14. Your friend group wrote a callout post because you kinned a problematic anime character. You know who won’t judge your kin list? The open road.
15. Buy red shoes. 8 pairs. Heels. That’ll teach you to underestimate me, Steven.
16. Turn left on Hollenbeck Avenue, then another left on Mill Street. The house is the second on the right. You don’t even need the GPS anymore; you know this drive like the back of your hand.
17. Sex is for losers. Jesus never had sex and he turned out fine, except for the crucifixion part.
18. U can text adn Drive in West Virginia!! :)) Right? I think that’s a thing… legally. 
19. You will never have any emotional problems ever in your life as long as you refuse to confront them.
20. Road food is the best food! You’ll get to eat out every night! Wendy’s, Arby’s, Benji’s, Hobee’s. Probably like a gas station or something too. A dumpster? Who knows!
21. Gig life is under appreciated! Think about the moral lessons you will learn by transporting that heavy, unmarked wooden crate from 3397 Mill Street, Seneca, SC 29672 to 4076  Lowland Drive, Winslow, IL 61089.
22. The week in Vegas is still a blur, but you’re pretty sure people get some sort of financial compensation if their spouses go missing. That’s assuming you actually got married… whatever. Whoever it is, you hope the cash does them good. At the very least, they can pawn the ring.
23. Imagine sleeping under the stars. A soft breeze in your hair, the crickets chirping in the night. The smell of cigarette smoke wafts through the streets of Northern Spokehampton. This city is beautiful, but the shine hides a deeper, uglier truth. The successful young upstarts passing you on the street look at you with a mixture of condescension and pity, but you know you’re richer than they’ll ever understand. Richer in life.
24. You hunch over a staticky old TV, watching panicked CBS reporters stumble through Mill Street, trying desperately to maintain composure in front of the cameramen. You feel a sick satisfaction spreading through your body.
25. WAP stands for What Areyoudoing Pleaseleaveyouroldlifebehind
26. Suspense is the best part of any movie! Who cares that your acting degree never went anywhere, when you could be living out a real-life movie scene by wondering whether or not you got herpes from that gas station bathroom toilet seat!
27. Your social security number is now 348-68-8238.
28. Singing with the windows down. Time to put on Death Grips! Nothing says “living your 20’s to the fullest” like driving in the car with the windows down, blaring your favorite bops  from the Spotify playlist you named “driving in the car with the windows down :)”
29. As long as you’ve already checked out, there’s no way the cops can trace that Motel 6 arson back to you. Suck it, losers! 
30. People always say “Yeah! I’m really glad I just took that year off to travel.” Those people could be you! And “year” could be a decade. Maybe 6 decades. Who knows! 
31. You’ve got a shoebox of passports shoved under the passenger seat of your Chevrolet, and as the sun hits your dashboard you grab one blindly. It doesn’t matter which you pick anymore, as long as you get to the next town by sunrise.
32. People outside of your immediate social circle are hard to cope with, but you still long for the sweet, fleeting intimacy of making eye contact with a stranger— nothing says social diversity like travel. 
33. Everyone likes a murder mystery. You could make state news, being that unidentified corpse that was just discovered lying in a ditch behind the Mill Street Dollar Tree parking lot at 3:13 pm local time on Tuesday, June 15th, 2021. If it’s gruesome enough you might even make national news!