Raylo,
How great that you figured everything out in less than a gazillion years. You won't be like us JW lifers dreaming about what might have been.
For my wife and I, our departure from JWdom plunged us both into a deep depression and launched a number of physical ailments I suspect wouldn't normally have manifested themselves until years later. The antidote? Classic movies. We saw everything black, white & English. How many times I recall coming home from work to a home with all the blinds drawn, Spencer Tracy, Kathryn Hepburn et al working their living room magic. We caught up on a generation of American culture we had missed. I still sigh when thinking of how incredibly beautiful the very young Hepburn, Bacall & others were in their heyday.
tms
ps: You may have gotten some of your "independent spirit" from your mother. Based on what you've stated, she sounds like an extraordinarily levelheaded JW.