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A roof over
our heads
When Mariel
called after 11 p.m. the other night I braced for late-night bad
news.
“Is
everything okay?” I asked nervously.
Turned out
that she just needed some advice about her long distance
apartment hunt. Mariel’s friends were having problems finding a
decent place at a normal price. When one of her friends called
last week telling us that she had finally found a place, we were
relieved. But that fell through, and time was growing shorter
and shorter. So Mariel’s call was for our approval of another
living arrangement, and considering that time was an issue and
commuting from Canton to Amherst every day was not an option, we
agreed. Hopefully, we’ll be able to finish up the paperwork this
week and can then look forward to the adventure of furnishing
her new abode.
Mariel’s
apartment hunt by proxy started me thinking about the home
hunting that we’ve undertaken. Steve’s first living arrangement
outside of the BU dorms was an apartment that he shared on
Commonwealth Avenue with about 50 other guys. I believe he said
that he bunked in the living room behind a partition. Ah, the
joys of living in Boston on a fixed budget. But once he
graduated and got a decent job, he was able to move to more
spacious accommodations in a nice apartment complex with only
one roommate and his very own bedroom — he was moving on up
indeed.
When I
visited him a few years later, I was so impressed with the place
that we rented an apartment in the same complex after we were
married.
The complex
was run by an enlightened owner who believed in upkeep. It was
clean, nicely landscaped and even had a pool. Most of the
apartments were rented out to young couples like us, and we
formed quite a few friendships around the pool. Steve even
played on a softball team that was founded by one of our
neighbors, and I spent many an evening cheering him on with the
rest of the players’ wives. But I never made any long lasting
friendships there. Most of the women were working just until
they could afford to have children and stay home, so my career
ambitions seemed rather exotic to them. In fact, they really
couldn’t understand me at all.
Still, it
was the perfect place for us. Steve worked at McClean Hospital
in Belmont, so his commute was short, and I was working in the
city and could catch the bus. We lived in Woburn, next door to
Burlington and down the road from Lexington, where there was
plenty of good shopping and restaurants.
But when
Steve changed jobs we had to move, and I wasn’t looking forward
to leaving. Especially since we were headed for a place called
the “South Shore” and I wasn’t sure that I was going to like it.
After
researching the surrounding towns, we settled on Quincy and
found ourselves a great apartment with an extra bedroom and a
huge terrace. You could actually see the Boston skyline from our
bedroom window.
My parents
loved the place, since Quincy was a walking town with actual
sidewalks, unlike Woburn where the car was king. When they came
to visit they could walk across the street to Shaw’s or into
Quincy Center to window shop, or, better yet, to the T stop,
where they could catch a train to Boston. Whenever they had
taken a stroll in Woburn, people would stop to ask them if they
were okay and if they wanted a lift to wherever they were going.
My folks would tell me that people couldn’t understand that they
were walking for pleasure.
We loved the
T and the fact that we could walk to town and not have to take
the car everywhere. Steve and I are two city mice at heart, who
have always appreciated subways and sidewalks.
We also
appreciated our spacious terrace where we would sit at the end
of a summer’s workday sipping a glass of wine. I bought
geraniums to plant in big pots and a cheap hibachi where we
tried to grill — though it smoked more than grilled — and we
would pretend that we were grown-up homeowners. Soon, a
combination of large yearly rent increases and my father’s
determination that we buy a place of our own would turn us into
real homeowners.
Through the
years, we moved to a condo in Braintree and then finally to our
home here in Canton. We’ve been incredibly lucky in all of our
searches. We’ve lived in lovely homes alongside good neighbors.
Our girls had their own rooms and a backyard to run around in.
They slid down their own slide, dug in their sandbox, splashed
in kiddy pools and had neighbors to play with. They made crowns
and bouquets from the purple wild flowers that grew in our yard.
Yes, we’ve
been lucky. Our home has not been bombed or destroyed by a
cyclone. We have not had to flee a volcano or tribal violence or
drought. We have had the same roof over our heads for the past
20 years. And I thank God and the fates and everything
responsible for such blessings.
The purple
flowers have arrived, and I think I’ll pick my own bouquet for
their beauty, their memories and most of all, for my good
fortune.
May 15, 2008
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