Searching for Oz on Zillow
I've been thinking too much about things I don't have
“You’re thinking too much about things you don’t have,” Joe said.
I’d been thinking how a yard could solve all our problems.
We’re in a 780-square-foot apartment in a Brownstone in Brooklyn. The city is lovely; I love the parks, the proximity to milk, the free public school for three-year-olds, and the neighbors. Especially the neighbors.
But the air. It might be killing us. And the toilet. It’s small. There’s only one. The boy's bedroom is a “0.5” bedroom. Yes, it fits a bunk, has a window, and a closet. But you have to walk over the bed to reach the closet. Yes, the ceilings are high, but where can they play? Where we work. I always hear everyone doing everything. Sure, I’d rather that than silence — inside the house, that is. I could use a little more silence outside the home. Henry saying, “It’s noisy here,” at bedtime back in Brooklyn, after a long trip to Minneapolis at 2 years old, still haunts me. But sometimes I hear birds, too. At least we have birds. Not everyone in the city can say that.
I just really want a yard. Somewhere other than the front stoop. Somewhere with a bit less foot traffic. So I could be in my robe, having coffee, feeling the early sun. That would make me feel like a Queen. I ought to feel like a Queen in my own home, right?
Own. Home. That’d be nice.
I’d like to own. But in this inflated city, with our unintended longevity, that’s a ridiculous thing to consider. And homes have fewer sight lines. I’d have more worries. What could two little boys be doing on the floor above?
I’m worrying about what I don’t have control over. It’s not my choice where we’ll be. We’re at the mercy of the breadwinner's career. Not me.
I know the lack of control is bothering me when I start browsing Zillow. I begin dreaming of a life in another place. With more space. A second toilet. A yard. Maybe, just maybe, a pool.
We’ve been to the public pool a half dozen times in two weeks. It’s not in our backyard, but not far from; A ten-minute walk if the boys stay in the wagon. We’re not alone. But that makes it more fun. Henry told me he learned new tricks from watching the grown-ups. And he made a friend. She held Louis and helped give Henry confidence. She encouraged him to keep practicing his swimming.
I got out of my space-based thought spiral – thinking of the things I don’t have – quickly this time. Because I’d been here before. I’ve had practice.
The first time I was pregnant with our baby, Louis. I was talking on the phone with my friend. She was living in Minnesota, where I’m from. She had a similar spiral. We shared the Zillow fixation.
I told her, “I can’t see my future anymore.”
I was on my front stoop. Sweat was dripping down my boobs and my bump. It was the summer. I was pregnant.
I said, “I’ve always known what's next. It used to be so clear. Even when I knew what I would have was outside of anything I’d seen before, I still felt it. I knew. But now. Now, I know what I’m doing tomorrow. I know that in ten years, I’ll have a thirteen-year-old and a nearly ten-year-old. God willing. But who am I but their mother? Where am I? What else will I be doing? Is the universe conspiring to make me appreciate the present? I appreciate it, fuck you, I’m in the park every day counting petals on flowers, picking up sidewalk pennies. Can’t I have a crumb of foresight? I just want to understand…”
She said, “What do you want to understand?”
“Well. Here’s an example. Yesterday. Just yesterday. Joe interviewed with someone in Australia. Melbourne. And afterwards, he interviewed somewhere in London. Tonight, he’s meeting a recruiter here, in the city. This week there were even more across the US.”
I waved my arms around me. At the dirt that’s just compacted dust. In the air.
“What’s the air quality index there?” I asked.
“Oh, ah, I’m not sure.”
“Yeah, I bet you have the windows open today.”
“I do,” she said.
“By the way, have you turned off those Zillow notifications?”
“Yeah. But it’s not helped me break the habit.”
“Yeah?”
“Yeah. I’m still looking.”
“Where?”
“Costa Rica lately.”
“Costa Rica? Quite warm there.”
“Yeah, well, my body prefers the heat,” she said. “So where would you like to be?”
“Wherever we’ll be happy,” I said.
“Can’t you be happy there?” she said.
I didn’t answer her. She knew I knew, and she knew I knew she knew. And because I started crying. And my neighbor was smoking a Marlboro, and even though I knew it was contributing to the air quality, it smelled nice. It reminded me of the summer Joe and I met. When I inhaled his and a dozen strangers' smoke in the garden of The Cock. I didn’t know what would happen next, then, and it didn’t matter.
That was three years ago, and I have no more idea of my future, but I have peace, most of the time, in the not knowing.
I sat in a sauna the other day. With my eyes closed, smelling cedar through burning nostrils, I could’ve been fifteen in the north of Minnesota. I could be myself in twenty years. With my eyes closed, I noticed droplets moving down my chest, around my boobs, and I could’ve been that pregnant woman crying on a sub-tropical summer stoop. And, I remembered, it doesn’t matter where I am. So long as when I open my eyes, I know how to get back home.
And when I open my eyes each morning, here, in our 780-square-foot apartment, the boys are just behind one wall. Today, they came to greet me.
“Hi, Mom!” they both said.
“Good morning, little babies,” I said.
Then I played their favorite tunes on the portable speaker, which doesn’t need to be portable because we can hear it everywhere. The boys jump-danced on the bed as I drank the coffee with cream Joe brought me, still tucked in.
Henry said, “Mom, you look beautiful! Like a Queen.”
On that call three summers ago, I told my friend that I wanted to feel that way —queenly. It was that sincere, girlish admission from my gut. I wanted us to be happy, but it was more than that – I wanted the joy to feel otherworldly.
She said, “What would it take to feel like a Queen where you are?”
I bought a second air conditioner that day. I started hanging art on the walls of our rental later that month. It wasn’t the things that changed how I felt, but the authority it took to make the change.
I focused on what I had, thought about how I wanted to feel, and made it so.
Our place will never be perfect. Completion, perfection, control, even the future, aren’t real. They’re illusions that squander what’s real. Like the water in the public pool, the dirt (however compact), and my people. Especially my people.
Dreaming of a mythical home where my needs are better met deprives me of the authority to meet my needs in my home. It leaves me searching for something missing in a fantastic world like Oz, when, really, there’s no place like home. Whether you own it or not.
Soundtrack:
Every week I feel grateful that you let me reach you this way — in your inbox, in your apps. This past week, I felt especially appreciative. So many of you are commenting, supporting, and many of you upgraded to paid subscriptions. Honestly, it shocks me. Maybe I’ll buy a stoop-friendly robe in your honor.
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Thank you, Abigail… all feelings deserve validation. I can clearly see the boys and Joe lovingly eyeing their “queen”… I can also see you snugly wrapped in your pretty new robe, enjoying the Brooklyn morning. 🌅🙏🏽☀️🙏🏽🌅
This really hit home. I have felt everything you have felt. Fantastic writing.