House hunting in Vermont (Episode 1)

Bing-bong—Catherine and Felix had been dating for two years when she decided to buy a forever home. Was this a good idea?

God help me. I’m writing a memoir. About once a month, I’ll share some early drafts, research, backstories, and scenes that won’t make the final cut. Like me, my midlife reinvention story is a work in progress.

In high school, my mother said, “Learn to type, and you’ll always have a job.” Four decades later—in a new relationship, peri-menopausal, and restless—I bought an old Vermont farmhouse, hired a “life wizard,” and left a fruitful career. Mom was right about the job, but what if I was meant to follow a different path? At 56, it was time to find out.

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If my Vermont house search were an episode of HGTV’s House Hunters, it would be hard to narrow the property choices to three. My realtor and I toured dozens over two years; Felix and I drove by hundreds more on long road trips through quaint, gentrified villages and desolate, once-thriving mill towns.

How my house hunters wish list might look on TV

I wanted perfect and picturesque—meadows and stone walls, an ensuite (of course), and nearby restaurants—at a bargain. Felix wanted land— lots of land! —and wasn’t afraid of renovations. But the decision wasn’t up to Felix.

In my house

As the Mary Jane Girls sang in the 80s, Felix could come and see me anytime, but we weren’t living together then, and we weren’t buying a house together. I was adamant about making the purchase independently.

I wanted more than a room of my own. I wanted the whole damn house.

I was forty-three when I lived alone for the first time. I left home for college roommates, roommates for a husband, then children in blink-of-the-eye succession. I was 39 and twice divorced when I bought my first house—the only house I could afford in my kids’ school district. It never felt like home to me; it felt like the least I could do.

I moved to an apartment the minute my youngest left for college. What a delight to find things where I’d left them, to know the last piece of pie would still be there in the morning, to sing show tunes and country music loudly and badly. But it was more than that.

To hear the sound of my voice—no roles to play, no expectations to meet, no selflessness required. No matter how off-key, I wasn’t giving that up.

Falling in love

A few years after I’d reclaimed my independence—or, more accurately, found it for the first time, I met Felix. Not long after that, we fell in love with Vermont’s rolling meadows and mountain views (and yes, with each other— awwww). We visited often and celebrated our second first-date anniversary by toasting with local, hoppy IPAs and sharing our fantasies of living here someday.

House-hunting began the following year with a goal of finding a base for our outdoor adventures. We’d fix it up over time. Then—in a faraway fuzzy future—we’d retire from our busy Boston careers and move here together.

We toured old houses mostly—fixers, foreclosures, and forlorn structures that were more hunting camp than home. Highlights included land abutting the local airport runway and a spacious foreclosure listed at $35K. When my realtor reached through a broken window to unlock the door for that one, she’d cautioned, “I think it’s overpriced.”  

When it came time to sign a purchase and sale agreement, I asked myself, what happens if Felix and I break up? Would I want to live by myself in rural Vermont? Was this my dream, or, as I used to, was I merely singing someone else’s tune?

The bumpy road to Vermont

I’d felt pulled to Vermont in a déjà vu moment the very first time Felix and I visited. And, for years after that, every highway exit ramp we passed driving south on Sunday nights back to our work-a-day lives was like a finger crooked and beckoning—this way.

I more than wanted the house in Vermont. I was called to it. I needed it. I had discovered my independence, but I was still searching for home—a place to find peace and purpose. More than a base for hiking or skiing—a foundation for the life I had yet to build for myself.

I wish I had recorded the number of miles we traveled while house hunting. But I didn’t track the distance or count the bumps in the road, and I don’t know what difference the analysis could make. Because every road traveled, no matter how bumpy has brought me closer to where I am meant to be—closer to myself.

[Spoiler Alert] I found my dream house.

Work hard. Be brave. Believe.

Catherine