Location, Location, Location

This is Offbeat Home's archive of Location, Location, Location posts.

What makes a tent/RV/house a home isn't always contained within its walls. These posts highlight the community surrounding the structures.

Most Recent Posts About Location, Location, Location

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The Long Hot Summer continues….The weather man says it's raining…

Photo by Keven Law. Used under Creative Commons license.

I grew up on the fringes of the biggest city in Canada, but lived the first ten years of my life on acres of land, surrounded by ancient trees, a forest for a backyard. I used to love being a contradiction, constantly carving out a place by leaning a little bit to one side, a little bit to the other. It was probably this strange beginning that shaped my love for both city and country: give me skyscrapers or rolling fields, but keep away that picket-fenced suburbia. For me suburbs are sort of like those rooms in the movies where the walls slowly close in on the hero trapped inside.

This ability to be equally at home in country or city is useful, but when you love both equally, it's a problem. What's a girl to do in her mid-twenties, firmly ensconced in being a real live adult and having to make the decision about where home will be right now?

What if all our neighborhoods had not just NAMES, but also IMAGES? Flags, patches, shirts. We'd be like The Warriors and shit!

San Francisco's Dogpatch neighborhood is kicking us off. Let's go!

Our cities are home to endless activity, people of all stripes, and our friendly (or creepoid) neighborhood weirdos.

Let us city dwellers sing a paean — a song of praise or triumph — for our cities. Let us stand together and celebrate our homes.

I was 21 years old when I moved to San Francisco. I was a glamorous big-city girl and I was ready to LIVE THE DREAM!

…oh, except for the fact that my $11/hr file clerk job barely paid me enough to cover rent and food.

I’m freshly showered, wearing my bathrobe, sipping my coffee on the back steps, when the turkey tom decides it’s time for some lovin' on an injured hen.

I grab a badminton racket and run barefoot across the yard to swat the 45-pound Kentucky Bourbon Red tom off her, bathrobe flapping to reveal all. This is what I call a “farm moment.”

Did you guys see this article that made the rounds last week, about how lists of livable cities almost never seem to include the cities where everyone, well, wants to live?

You know how most of the time people write tip lists it's like nine things that are so obvious anyone could write the list, and then one maybe-useful idea? Katie's list of ways to ease international moves is not that type of list. It's like years of experience compacted down for the newbie.

I'm popping my head up after seven years beginning my nursing career, only to discover my neighborhood is lacking. How do you add culture to a community?