This is the Amplify newsletter, where you can be inspired and challenged by the voices, opinions and insights of women at The Globe and Mail, and our contributor community.
Kate Helmore is a freelance journalist based in B.C. writing on climate and agriculture for The Globe and Mail and producing for CBC Radio.
In the fairy tale ending, the young princess and the prince, having slayed the dragon, ride off into the sunset together, mounted on a white stallion. The horizon is empty as they embark on a new adventure.
In the modern fairy tale, two young people walk into a house. It’s not just any house – it’s their new home, with their name on the mortgage. There are multiple rooms, even different levels. Their golden retriever bounds out into the backyard. The promise of growing a family stretches out before them.
Recently, the latter tale has become as dream-like as the first.
Employment is unstable for many. Wages have failed to keep up with inflation. And home prices keep climbing. You’ve heard it all before, and chances are you’re sick of hearing it. If you’re like me, a woman approaching 30, these headlines have taken root in the pit of your stomach, a deep knot of anxiety. I have this vision of myself panting on a treadmill, one that’s pointed upwards and picking up speed. I’m stumbling and desperate to get off. But this is life. There is no exit.
The end goal is marriage – that’s what I’ve been told by the generations that have come before me. A single woman (regardless of her possessions) must be in want of a husband, no? I am to find a man and settle down. Just the two of us, building our castle in suburbia.
I’ve ticked one box: the man. But that’s about it. Even with our combined incomes, we’re not anywhere close to coming up with a down payment any time soon. That was a tough pill to swallow. But now that it’s down, I’m rethinking the whole fairy tale ending. I’m not so sure I want the castle any more, or at least not the two-person variety.
I live with five people in an old heritage house in Vancouver. We cannot afford to live alone or as pairs with our respective partners. At times it feels like a sitcom. The nerdy one gets himself into an awkward romantic situation. The strait-laced one learns a thing or two about chaos. The animal lover feeds the raccoons and ravens while the eccentric one dresses accordingly. We have bumblebee hives in the backyard, and we host barbecues and bingo nights.
Row upon row of homes in the Greater Toronto Area, as seen from a helicopter in June, 2019.Fred Lum/The Globe and Mail
At times I wonder when the grand finale is coming. When will this group of oddballs put their keys on the table and walk out the door? But the question that always follows is, why would we? Do we really have to leave? Can’t we buy a property together somewhere and perpetually continue this existence?
Around 500,000 years ago, the human brain diverged dramatically from our fellow primates. Significantly less developed at birth, with sponges for brains, we humans were given an extended childhood in which neural networks are constantly made and unmade, formed by the world around us.
This gooey, flexible childhood brain is the foundation of our brilliance. But it also makes us useless, at first. A zebra comes out of the womb kicking and running. A human baby cannot hold up its own head. Not a good trait for a nasty and brutish prehistoric world. Unless you have a community. Communal living was the key to our survival as a species.
Granted, in 12th-century medieval Europe we did move slightly toward single-family households organized around monogamous couples and their children, but they were a far cry from the nuclear model. The households were comprised of family members and friends, but also a variety of neighbours, including those who didn’t have the means to make it on their own – poor married couples, widows, orphans. Community members constantly moved between houses; there was little concept of a privately owned dwelling place. This communal living has been the norm throughout human history. Traditionally, most people have not had the time, money or resources to run a household alone.
I hear that.
We have the end of the 19th century to thank for the elevation of the single-family unit to “necessity” status. The Industrial Revolution made running a household more efficient, and urbanization broke apart the more traditional sense of community. Individual ownership would eventually reign supreme.
So, where does this leave me? I am certainly not about to invite random townspeople into my rental house as new roommates (though I suppose that’s how Kijiji works). But it does make me rethink the concept of home and what it really means to be an adult.
Nothing is set in stone. Our beliefs can be as spongey, changeable and impressionable as that of a newborn baby. And to me, they’ve been formed by the era in which I find myself.
Looking back at our collective history has helped to alleviate the pressure: Stories of communal living in centuries past have inspired me to browse listings for big houses fit for many families.
It looks as though I’ll be designing my own happily ever after, however I see fit.
What else we’re thinking about:
I’m tired of being monolingual – one of the downsides of speaking the lingua franca, I suppose. And so, despite its more annoying features, I’m back on the Duolingo train.
Granted, the app’s little green owl (Duo) can be overly persistent with notifications telling me to check in – he’s borderline aggressive at times. But overall, I’ve been impressed by how the app has evolved since I last used it five years ago. It’s got lots of different types of exercises and is quite playful and gratifying. Plus, I can use the app even when I’m stuck in a service dead zone.
Best of all, my Spanish seems to be coming back to me. Maybe some day I’ll be able to say something sophisticated, like I’ve been reading the original texts of Gabriel Garcia Márquez or Jorge Luis Borges. A girl can dream.
Marianne
Marianne Kushmaniuk for The Globe and Mail
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