Does anyone else have a “there, but for the grace of god, go I” feeling when they look at Caroline?

At base, I probably share some qualities with CC: laziness, insecurity, narcissism, class anxiety, family mental illness, a tendency towards self-aggrandizement. But over the course of my early 20s my personality evened out a lot as I was forced to just work, pay bills, live with 5 roommates and 1 bathroom, and just figure out my way in the world while dealing with a limited set of imperfect options. If my path has been rockier or if I’d had less luck in making a life, I might have suffered more—but looking at Caro I am also convinced that if I’d had family paying my rent and bailing me out and buying me tickets to May balls every so often, I might NEVER have gotten my shit together!!! Seriously. If someone else had kept me in rent, therapy money, and fluffy sweaters throughout my 20s while also not holding me accountable for ANYTHING, I am 100% sure I’d be an absolute monster. It was having to do food service/child care/office drone work, and getting to live with other people who worked hard and valued mutual respect, that finally gave me the sense of accountability I hadn’t gotten from my weird family or upbringing. And this all naturally allowed me to find myself in other ways, too: I realized my artsy/intellectual interests and aspirations required hard work and also involved ethics and politics and matters of responsibility. Sometimes I look at Caro and my heart breaks because I see and love but also fear the person I might have been if things had gone differently. In various ways.

So sort of feel like the only thing that could save our bean would be getting a Starbucks gig (for the health insurance) and moving in with roommates in Deepest Queens... but I worry it is already too late for her. Hopefully there are other paths. But if she finds herself we probably (god willing) won’t see it, because it will be off this hell medium.