I bought a House!
Coming out from hibernation with something BIG
Oh hi, I owe you an apology. I’ve been letting myself succumb to big negative self-shamey sorts of feelings that I know are not worth the time and energy that I give them. In the observation of my own self sabotage, a new layer of self shame curls it’s way around my fingers and stops me from creating. Layers and layers of shame, guilt, fear and old stories cropped up and kept me quite for the last few months. And that’s how we end up here, 7 months forward from my last newsletter to you.
I’ve got my pruning shears and I’m going hard on the weeds of my mind that have kept me hidden away. I feel rusty in my writing, but fuck it, I want to be here. So I’ll write and share in whatever messy way is necessary to pull out the good stuff and get back into a flow.
So let’s start with a HUGE life update:
My partner and I bought a house.
This was honestly the wildest ride of my life. Stars aligned, the right things came together at the exact right moment after a few months that felt like a lot of not right things colliding, and we bought a house. I’m still in half-disbelief.
V and I had been talking about homeownership for a while. It’s complicated. We are both socialists who truly believe in sharing with others and fighting for equality for all. I could explain that more eloquently, but I guess I’m more simple than I’d like to be perceived. I aspire to be Mr. Rogers-like in my beliefs and choices. There is a housing crisis in America and just last week the Supreme Court decided that unhoused people should be punished for sleeping on the street when so many have no access to a place to safely rest their head. I hate this. The US government is a joke. And I live here, so blugh… I’m trying my best to figure out how to live within an absurd reality, care for myself and others, and also not spiral into a real bad headspace. Here’s to hoping we can find creative ways to house people on our property as time and finances allow. We have dreams.
When it comes to the home buying process, my partner and I have shared beliefs about “house hunting.” We both believe if you are white folks who have the means to buy a home, don’t buy a home in a neighborhood that is going to displace marginalized people who have historically lived there. If you have the ability to move into a more affluent neighborhood that needs some change when it comes to inclusivity, then do it, be the change and make change happen for those who have less access than you. We’re two white queer neurodivergent she/theys. We have massive privilege in a lot of ways, and in other ways, we don’t feel so comfortable nor safe around people who look like us. So the decision of what neighborhoods around Seattle we should consider looking within alongside the outrageous over-pricing of just about every house within an hour of Seattle has been uhhhh interesting.
It’s hard for me to tell you the giddy, beautiful, kismet-feeling story of how our house became our home without first mentioning the points above. I don’t take having the ability to buy a house at the exact time that we did, lightly. And somehow, amidst the terrifying and challenging and confusing parts of pursuing buying a home, we truly did get extremely lucky and have seen our dreams come true. And I want to embody gratitude.
At the end of November 2023, we spotted a home on an island outside of Seattle that had been sitting on the market for 6 months and appeared to be in really good shape. We were looking for a unique home, one with just enough space for us, 2 humans and 2 dogs, something around 1200 sq ft. And then we wanted some sort of additional space on the property that could house friends because we really want to live in community. We hoped for a yard for our dogs, space for me to make art and write and for V to work from home while finishing their Ph.D. We expected we could only afford something that would take a LOT of fixing up over many many many years, but when we spotted THIS house we thought, oh SHIT is this our actual dream house and should we risk going over budget in hopes that we may never move ever again?
We visited the house on a Sunday and discovered that the listing hadn’t clarified that the entire second story was a mother in law unit with 1 bedroom, a full kitchen and beautiful wooden beams and skylights. Most people viewing the space that day were disappointed to find the house was not a true 3 bedroom with 2000+ sq ft, but a 1200 sq ft, 2 bedroom on the ground floor and a 1000 sq ft 1 bedroom on the top floor with both indoor access and private outdoor access to both. This was a DREAM for us, separate but shared space to live with friends!
We wandered around the property and found not one but 2 Sequoias, incredible redwood trees planted here around the 1962 World Fair. We followed the paths created by the former home owners and caretakers of this magical land and found ourselves getting teary-eyed and both saying to each other, “THIS, all of this, feels like the good parts of our childhoods!” I grew up in forested areas of Northern California and and my partner grew up in a canyon in San Diego. When telling my therapist about my excitement about finding this house she said, “WOW you are truly in love Moorea. Like, this is THE one!” To which I said, “Oh my god, you’re right. I feel like I never knew ‘that’ feeling but this IS it!” I once was a repressed young bride in my twenties marrying a man who liked the idea of me but did not accept me. And when I did the whole ‘trying on wedding dress’ thing that I never wanted to do but did to appease him, I never had that ‘it’s the one!’ feeling with a wedding dress.
But this house, it is the one. V and I both were head over heels in love with it and all it represented. We had casually looked at a variety of houses around the greater Seattle area in months before, and that day, we viewed one more house after feeling the overwhelm of falling in love with our dream home. As soon as we stepped into the property of the second house, I felt so uncomfortable and blurted out, “This reminds me of everything I don’t want to remember from my childhood. I do not feel good here.” And it was clear, the little house with a mother in law unit in the woods on an island was THE one we wanted. It was the first house we ever put an offer on. A day after seeing it in person, we made an offer and wrote a letter to whomever was selling it (the seller was anonymous) and shared honestly about how we are a queer couple who want to keep everything as it is, share this place with friends and family, be caretakers of the land, and live here forever with our doggos.
The day after that, at 1 in the afternoon, we were told our offer was accepted!
One other couple had put in an offer, but they had mentioned to the seller that they wanted to construct a new garage rather than keep the open carport, they wanted to make modifications to the house and that they didn’t like dogs. Apparently, the dog thing was a deal breaker for the seller. We share a driveway with a few other houses and everyone on our road has & loves dogs so the seller felt like we’d be a better fit. And though it felt risky and scary to say in our letter that we are queer, knowing that there are plenty of people in this area who would not want us buying from them, it ended up being something that united us with the former owners.
Our house was built by an elderly queer couple as their dream retirement home after their original home burned down. They were able to live in it for a long time and SO much of the house reflects their character and energy. To get to be a young queer couple buying from an elderly queer couple, I just can’t express how profound this felt for us. It’s SO rare. It’s so special! One of the former home owners was a hobbyist woodworker and built all of the cabinets (A LOT OF CABINETS) throughout the house. We’re obsessed with their balance of quirkiness and efficiency. So many things were built in to the house that we haven’t had to buy any furniture when moving in. What we already had works beautifully. Ok, I did end up buying a used drafting file cabinet to store my art stuff, but other than that, the dream the former owners created was our dream too. We’re a queer couple in our late 30s, dreaming of what retirement could look like if we are ever lucky enough to get there in this damn late stage capitalist country. So we’re grateful to get to be in a home where we feel comfortable and safe while we work on paying off that bonkers mortgage over the rest of our lifetime.
Homeownership is a LOT. We haven’t had to make any huge changes to the home aesthetically, but we have had to things like have a skirt drain put in around the entire exterior to protect the basement from flooding. You know, fun bank-account-draining things that you’d never notice if you didn’t ask, the sorts of things that make sure this house stays solid for as long as it can. Honestly, we’re amazed at how efficiently this house was made, a wood stove that heats up our entire space downstairs! The upstairs has tons of skylights and a propane stove to keep it warm in winter. There are lots of windows to let in light, thoughtful storage space, really beautiful caretaking of the trees and plants and flowers on the land, it’s so obvious the original owners loved it here. And we love it too.
And good god, do I feel the PUSH to get back on my working game. Because baby, we’ve got a mortgage to pay and random things that do need some fixin’. I’ve managed to teach myself how to fix a washing machine all by myself. Yeehaw! And my partner fixed the fridge! We’re doing it! We’ve got a home to call our own and share with community, and lots of prompting to learn how to DIY fix everything until we have some dollars to buy replacement for things that, for now, are chugging along.
I repainted all 1000 sq ft of the mother in law unit within a week back in April. It had to be done. The original wall color was a sad murky brown and some treasured friends of ours have committed to living above us for the next year! I wanted their space to feel fresh and customizable to them, not dreary like its original color. I replaced all the floor tile in the upstairs kitchen, hung a new light, bought a used rug cleaner from Home Depot and cleaned the crap out of the wall to wall carpet (Maybe in a few years we can afford to put down some faux wood flooring or something. Buy something from my website, and you could help us get there sooner lol. Love you.)
Timeline:
December: viewed house + placed a bid + got it!
January: paid our downpayment, took on loans and moved in!
March: did all we could to get settled (still so much to do, but that’s homeownership)
April: I gave the mother in law unit a makeover and our friends moved in!
May: I began part time working at the local museum (And met some badass locals who care about social justice and are leading the way on the island. Count me in on every cause.)
June: My birthday + one of our roommates birthdays. Gemini’s 4eva.
July: And here we are. I’m coming up for air, checking in with where I am at, getting back to the things that fuel me emotionally, spiritually, physically, mentally and financially. And I’m ready to know what it feels like for a year to elapse without having to move.
In the 20 years I lived in Seattle, I moved 20 times. My longest stay in an apartment was 3 years and it ended with divorce a few weeks before the pandemic started. Fun times. In 2020 alone, I moved 4 times. Awful times, but damn I became an efficient packer and extremely self reliant. Most of my years renting in Seattle included up to 6 roommates at a time. The first time I could afford to live alone was post-divorce in 2020, when I had to live alone because of covid and when rent prices dropped because everyone was leaving the city.
I’ve lived in a yurt, in a shed, in a converted garage, a 260 sq ft loft, in a converted garage behind my sister’s house. I’ve lived in rat infested houses, a basement room that flooded with sewage water, a wild array of apartments varying between 350 sq ft and 1750 sq ft. I’ve lived in communal living apartments where we all share a kitchen on the same floor, and I lived for a few brief months in a luxury apartment 30 stories up in downtown Seattle. I’ve lived in 11 different neighborhoods across Seattle, and lasted the longest in Capitol Hill.
And now, I’m on an island I never thought I’d ever end up on. I dreamed of moving to Ireland for many years, a country, community and people I adore and respect. And maybe when I’m old, i’ll get the chance to live their for a time (I hope and dream.) But for now and for the foreseeable future, I’m living island life with the person I love and the dogs I am so lucky to care for, on a tiny island outside of Seattle.
Are there a lot of people our ages over here? Not really. Is there a queer community? Erm, kind of sort of, mostly old folks and high schoolers. But we do have a few friends who live here and I’m meeting more :) I determined to do some community organizing not just for communities that I am a part of, but any and all groups that are underrepresented here. I’ve met a few seriously inspiring folks in the social justice space by working part time at the local museum. One incredible woman I want to shout out is Chastity Malatesta. I’ve been lucky to know her for just one month out of the 6 I have been here, and she gives me so much hope for creating some positive and radical change within a sleepy little community just outside of Seattle.
To own a home is a privilege. To get to call a place my home, my permanent home feels wild. The longest I ever stayed in one place was 10 years from the ages of 8-18 and it’s been temporary living since then. Honestly, the age 8-18 years never felt like they were grounded in a home. I never wanted to move back to America as a kid. My first conscious years were spent in a village in rural England and moving back to the US was a shock that echoed through me until maybe recently. Now the current events of the US are the main noises rattling around inside my head. I’ve been detached from the US since I got here, unwilling to commit. But with the right person / companion / lover / partner in socialist agenda, and the right place we can “own” under a capitalist system - one that can house others and hopefully many more in the future - I’m committing to being here.
Our home is on ancestral land of the SUq'wabs, “People of Clear Salt Water” (Suquamish People) in the Southern Lushootseed language. It has been the primary home of the Suquamish people since time immemorial. It is the ancient place on Agate Passage, the site of Old-Man-House Village, the winter home of Chief Seattle and the heart of the Suquamish people. The Suquamish people are still here and have always been here.
