From News 14 Carolina:
The National Retail Association reports in 2003 single women bought one in five homes. That’s close to two million homes.
The share of homes bought by single women has increased about 33 percent over the past decade, making single women the fastest growing segment of the home buying population.
I would also like to see Ron make the case that prominent white supremacists both individuals in power who publicly…
You can find plenty of examples of leftists claiming that white people and “white supremacy” are the cause of problems…
> They’re starting out the same. No, they're really not! It's hard to pick just one out of the many…
You might be right! I was seeing it as a plastic disposable knife, but it could be a spoon. What…
In panel 4, I think that might be intended to be a spoon. Or maybe I just see it like…
Thanks, La Lubu. I wasn’t aware of the tax breaks of owning a home; I’ll have to look into that a bit more.
Of course stay-at-home parents work, go object to Gloria Steinem and all the people who called them parasites. The point is, they aren’t competing for the same jobs and housing as their working spouse. There are all sorts of well-off marriages where both spouses work. That undeniably makes it harder for everyone else. We can decide if we want, as a society, everyone to have to work, or only some of us. I say some of us. It was a huge Pig con job to convince women to start working in careers, it’s disgusting. Whoever decided that things weren’t getting done fast enough, and we needed more people driving to work every day? Oh, yeah, probably women. Work sucks, and it really is disrespectful to imply that it is some luxury that only men get to enjoy.
Lubbuck, baby, my wife doesn’t work. That’s one of the side effects of chronic pain syndrome, the inability to have a career. But it’s nice to know what sort of assumptions you make about people who dispute what you say. In fact, when I met my wife I had never been in debt. Now, thanks to the wonders of Health Insurance in these United States, we owe an awful lot of money. Unlike the selfish wonder that you seem to be, I married for love, not money. Although money would certainly be a nice addition to love. Hell, money is a nice addition to anything.
And this just kills me:
It was a huge Pig con job to convince women to start working in careers, it’s disgusting.
That reminds me of nothing so much as the early appearances of the Ferengi on TNG…. “You make your females wear clothing? Disgusting!”
Your views, sir or madam, are frankly misogynistic and off-putting.
Lubbuck, if you want it to be possible to have couples & families survive on a single income, you might want to advocate for things like universal health care & guaranteed minimum incomes before you relegate the vast majority of the population to poverty.
Gloria Steinem called SAHM’s parasites? Gloria Steinem?
Look, I know that you’re used to thinking of feminism as a monolithic ideology, and I know that you’re used to thinking of leading feminist thinkers as interchangeable. But whatever feminist you’re radically misinterpreting here, I guarantee you it ain’t Gloria Steinem.
Gloria Steinem came under fire from the mainstream when she included sex in an essay that attempted to itemize the tasks routinely done by homemakers and attach monetary value to them so as to get people to recognize them as hard work. In fact, that was one of her earliest interactions with the media. So you’re wrong.
Gloria Steinem–and feminists in general–do not characterize homemakers as parasites. They characterize them as relatively powerless, because their difficult and important work is largely unrecognized and uncompensated. They depend on their husband’s income for money. The solution to this is not to demonize homemakers or to disparage their work further, but to increase social support for parenting and to recognize the work that women do, whether they receive a paycheck or not.
Scroll up to #35, and reread your own comment equating a homemaker with a “jobless male,” and then scroll down to #37 and see what a self-described feminist says about work inside the home. Feminists aren’t the ones pretending that homemakers don’t work.
No man can call himself liberal, or radical, or even a conservative advocate of fair play, if his work depends in any way on the unpaid or underpaid labor of women at home, or in the office. –Gloria Steinem
Certainly we have to eliminate the forces that make people feel that both spouses need to work. But ostracizing dual income rich families and convincing them to give up one job and one SUV wouldn’t relegate anyone to poverty.
I am wary about universal health care cause I think it is offered as a way to undermine marriage and to give a big blank check to big pharma. But if it was done right, and returned us to more basic and cheaper medicine that was available to everyone equally, I’d be for it. Then all the things that weren’t covered by the plan, like expensive transplants and stuff, we’d tax the shit out of, so that even the rich couldn’t afford them. Life and health care should be seen as a blessing, not an entitlement.
We can trust you to leave single female homebuyers the hell alone, then? Along with middle-class dual-income families? I’m pretty sure La Lubu, et al. don’t have Suburbans. (I’ll have to reevaluate my friendships with all y’all if I’m mistaken.)
“[Housewives] are dependent creatures who are still children…parasites.” ~ Gloria Steinem, “What It Would Be Like If Women Win,” Time, August 31, 1970.
“A parasite sucking out the living strength of another organism…the [housewife’s] labor does not even tend toward the creation of anything durable…. [W]oman’s work within the home [is] not directly useful to society, produces nothing. [The housewife] is subordinate, secondary, parasitic. It is for their common welfare that the situation must be altered by prohibiting marriage as a ‘career’ for woman.” ~ Simone de Beauvoir, The Second Sex, 1949.
The point is, they aren’t competing for the same jobs and housing as their working spouse.
They would be, however, competing for the men who have jobs. What, pray tell, would you advocate for women who DO NOT marry, or cannot marry (women do outnumber men, you know). Again, I must say, if you think it’s selfish, make it so when you marry, you figure out which ones more useful to society, and have that individual work, the other keep house. That would make me feel less annoyed at you if you advocated that, even though it’s still impossible.
There are all sorts of well-off marriages where both spouses work.
And there are poor families where neither works. Point?
That undeniably makes it harder for everyone else.
Oh, I can deny that a great deal. What if they are both doctors? They just improved the lives of everyone they saved, and/or eliviated the pain of. Maybe they both are really good professionals, and bad homemakers. They wouldn’t be benefiting anyone if they were doing a job inappropriate for them.
We can decide if we want, as a society, everyone to have to work, or only some of us. I say some of us.
The point was made before, but it bares repeating: everyone would still be working. Mom’s work A LOT, and it’s underpaid.
It was a huge Pig con job to convince women to start working in careers, it’s disgusting.
Fallacy. Women have always had out-of-home jobs, if not careers. Stay-at-home was a privillege of the rich. And you didn’t have to convince a lot of women that they should have a CHOICE of doing what they are best at, or what they want to do
Whoever decided that things weren’t getting done fast enough, and we needed more people driving to work every day? Oh, yeah, probably women.
Actually, it was probably WWII, something started by a bunch of men. I’d like to know you’re logic in saying that women “decided things weren’t getting done fast enough”.
Work sucks, and it really is disrespectful to imply that it is some luxury that only men get to enjoy.
Disagree again. I know lots of people who enjoy what they do. Besides, it’s irrelevant, we all have to work, it just depends on what. What the luxury is/was is being able to decide and work towards what work you get to do.
Call yourself a moralist all you want, I don’t see how moral it is to have double standards based on XX or XY. Go away troll until you get evidence or actual logic.
And I just saw this bit:
What medical costs do you think cause poor and middle-class people to go bankrupt, if not catastrophic, long-term illnesses that require “expensive transplants and stuff?”
Minor medical costs build up, and they can be considerable, but people don’t go bankrupt because they need a flu shot. They go bankrupt when they have heart attacks, or ectopic pregnancies, or cancer.
Transplants are decadent now? Do you long for the good old days, when self-respecting adults would just go on dialysis? Or just, you know, die?
But Lubbuck, if it improves my life, I’m doing it wrong, aren’t I? Isn’t marriage a “sacrifice” I undertake for the good of the world? If I enjoyed it, it wouldn’t be much of a sacrifice, would it?
And, without the dual incomes in my home, we wouldn’t be able to afford the house–I don’t make enough. So yeah, being a housewife would be a huge sacrifice that might result in losing my mind and my house, but there’s some intangible social benefit, so I better do it.
Okay, I had to check out the parasite quote by Gloria Steinem, and took out a subscription to the Time magazine to get to see the archive. It was two bucks, and I think it was worth it.
Here, I posted it on my livejournal, read it yourself. Lubbuck misquoted it and took it out of context.
http://www.livejournal.com/users/antigone_reborn/19268.html
Wow, that’s really pretty shamefully dishonest quoting. Thanks, Antigone.
Lubbock, I think you’ve had your fair say here. Please don’t post on my blog anymore.
Thanks for doing that Antigone…
I think that buying can save money, because rent just keeps spiraling up, and up, and up and up…Unbelievable.
Of course, there are days when you spend money, like if you have termites, which I found out today.
Ha ha! Ladies Against Feminism is your source material?
So you were radically misinterpreting Simone de Beauvoir, then?
Because Gloria Steinem’s remarks, in context, are exactly what I said they were: a complaint about the devaluation of women’s work, not devaluation itself.
Do you get that there’s a difference between calling someone a “parasite” in the sense of “dependent,” “secondary,” and “subordinate,” and calling someone a parasite in the sense of “useless?” Just as there’s a difference between calling someone a child in a legal and social sense and calling someone childlike in intellect or maturity?
Of course you don’t.
This is what de Beauvoir was talking about: “Few tasks are more like the torture of Sisyphus than housework, with its endless repetition: the clean becomes soiled, the soiled is made clean, over and over, day after day. The housewife wears herself out marking time: she makes nothing, simply perpetuates the present. She never senses conquest of a positive Good, but rather indefinite struggle against negative Evil. A young pupil writes in her essay: ‘I shall never have house-cleaning day’; she thinks of the future as constant progress towards some unknown summit; but one day, as her mother washes the dishes, it comes over her that both of them will be bound to such rites until death. Eating, sleeping, cleaning–the years no longer rise up towards heaven, they lie spread out ahead, grey and identical. The battle against dust and dirt is never won.” –Simone de Beauvoir, The Second Sex
She was describing the killing tedium and drudgery of household chores for women who have no other options. And she was pointing to an even greater problem for women: they labor as servants, in support; they produce nothing that they can point to and say, “See? This is my contribution to the world. This is what I’ve accomplished.” De Beauvoir, as an existentialist philosopher, was concerned with the implications of designating half of the population as helpmeets to the other half, turning them into people with no lives of their own.
Thanks for posting that article, I saw that when i googled, but didn’t want to pay 2 cents…
Here’ s the sentence:
“When society stops encouraging men to be exploiters and women to be parasites, they may turn out to be more complementary in emotion as well.”
So isn’t she saying that currently, women are encouraged to be parasites? Presumably, by not working in careers?
Aw. Spoil all my fun. I guess there wasn’t much troll-meat left on the bones anyway.
Hey, it wasn’t dishonest quoting. I googled and found this page, and that’s all it had. I tried to find larger context, but didn’t shell out the two bucks.
Come on, people like arguing with me. I’m on topic and respectful.
I am almost certain not to gain money by buying instead of renting. (House costs = high; mortgage tax breaks = not here; rent costs = low; political uncertainty = volatile.) Possibly a place would go up in value enough. I am unlikely, though, to *lose* money. I am doing it for the intangibles.
Lubbock has said that the dishonest quoting was accidental – he was quoting a secondary page, not the primary source. He’d like to be re-instated so he can continue the discussion.
If there’s anyone here who wants to keep on talking this over with Lubbock, let me know, by email or by posting, and I’ll unban him. Otherwise, I’m afraid he’s staying banned – the (accidental) dishonest quoting was just the latest in a series of straws.
Antigone, check this out.
Given the suspiciously similar punctuation, I’m guessing he found them out of context and never bothered to actually trace them or read anything by the feminists misquoted in the essay.
See? I’m always right.
Maybe you could make him write a five-paragraph report on The Second Sex first.
Tell Lubbuck to check his sources better next time. Unban him, he might actually have something useful to say later.
Yes, unban him. He will either have learned a valuable lesson about the credibility of his sources or he will continue to be an amusingly harmless retrograde clown. One way or another we win.
Wow Piny, you were right.
Lubbuck, do you REALLY feel you could trust a source that is “Ladies Against Feminism”? Seriously, anyone could tell that they had an agenda. If I went on God Hates Fags I’d be backchecking their experimental evidence, that’s for sure.
Yes. She isn’t saying, exactly, that women don’t labor and contribute–what would men “exploit,” if they didn’t? She’s saying that society encourages dependence–one meaning of parasitism–by encouraging women to become housewives. And this is true: a woman who isn’t earning money of her own is dependent on her husband’s income and goodwill. There are a whole host of problems that arise from this dynamic, problems that feminism attempted to identify and address.
This doesn’t mean that housework is a bad thing, or a useless thing. It means that people who are forced to do devalued, uncompensated work and then forced to think of themselves as servants rather than agents are dangerously unprotected and chronically demoralized.
A woman with a career is a woman in control of her own finances and her own life. She also gets to think of herself as doing something valuable, contributing something durable, precisely because we as a society value work outside the home. De Beauvoir wanted this option open for women, especially since her era didn’t seem likely to start valuing the “second shift” more.
Unban him.
Termites.
Rude councilman trying to bait me.
hairball hurling cats….
I need a little laughter….
piny: nope, no Suburban here! ;) I drive a fourteen-year-old rustbucket S-10, which I hope to trade in on a slightly used, non-rustbucket S-10 later on in the year. Gahh. I hate the thought of making payments again, but my little truck is beyond redemption at this point.
Lubbuck, are you a Luddite? Do you long for the days when there was no indoor plumbing, no electricity? Do you rue the day the Industrial Revolution began? ‘Cuz I’m still trying to figure out your angle, here.
I mean, I can understand one spouse staying home with young children. But what about when the kids are in school? Or folks who don’t have kids (yeah, I know. You probably think this is wrong too. But face it, some people are infertile, and some people flat-out do not want children.). Or whose kids are grown? You don’t think that person is going to be bored out of their ever-loving mind? Or, in the event that the non-employed spouse is pursuing all his/her passions, that their partner (you know, the one slaving for the paycheck keeping that boat afloat?) isn’t going to be a teensy-weensy bit resentful? ‘Cuz, I don’t know about you, but I’m not that sloppy. It doesn’t take a whole helluva lot to keep house for a relatively small family. Unless, maybe you’re advocating for the minimum family size to be say, six or more people. And then we’re pretty much back to more than one wage-earner being necessary.
I suppose we women don’t need all that pesky education either, since it just gives us uppity ideas, like that we should use our full range of skills, and be treated as equals and such.
Uh, Lubbock, do you really think a site called Ladies Against Feminism is a fair and impartial site? I’d say unban him, but that’s because I want him to answer some questions.
Lubbuck:
Are you arguing for a more communal way of living, i.e. if people got married and shared their homes with each other and their children, essentially they are taking up less space, pooling their resources, splitting costs, etc? Because I can get behind that line of thinking. For instance, my lesbian partner and I live with another roommate for that very reason. One day we hope to have some land that more of us can share. Like five of us. And any kids that come along with that. Call it a commune, whatever, but we’re doing it so that we can share resources. And it sounds pretty similar to your arguments, would you agree?
I’m curious though, why in your scenerio (marriage) it is the man who has to work, and why both parties wouldn’t just contribute equally. And divide everything else up equally? Why not argue your position with the foundation of equality? Why the sexism?
HC
Piny was right? Piny??? Ahem…
Me: Of course stay-at-home parents work, go object to Gloria Steinem and all the people who called them parasites.
Piny: Gloria Steinem called SAHM’s parasites? Gloria Steinem? Look, I know that you’re used to thinking of feminism as a monolithic ideology, and I know that you’re used to thinking of leading feminist thinkers as interchangeable. But whatever feminist you’re radically misinterpreting here, I guarantee you it ain’t Gloria Steinem.
Gloria Steinem not only called housewives parasites (saying that society encourages them to be parasites doesn’t diminish this slur) she also derided the value of housework.
That Ladies Against Feminism site is pretty good, actually. I learned that Marx led to feminism, and so when I called myself a marxist moralist, I was gong by a rather general understanding of what marxism meant to me, and not, apparently, what it meant to Marx. (But, as we all know now, Marx was wrong! What I mean by Marxism, and what Marx himself believed, is that there is a social and cultural imperitive to work together to help us all live dignified lives and not let the capitalists exploit or manipulate us, and that human meaning and morality is more important than capital and “free enterprise”, which is the enemy of morality)
Here’s a quote from that article again:
In fact, the more radical feminists of the 19th and 20th centuries wholeheartedly embraced Karl Marx’s Communist Manifesto, which called for women to be pushed out of the home and into factories, since the labor of men and women must be made “equal” while capitalism and private property were abolished.
Now, see, I think that pushing women into factories and careers and making work “equal” is a tool of the capitalists, who want a larger pool of interchangable workers. I guess he didn’t see it as capitalism because in his mind, the factory would be owned by “the people” but in my mind, a factory is a factory, and it owns the people.
yes, I would say I am a luddite. Sure, I’d go back to outhouses and hard work. Well, it makes no sense to tear out the pipes, now that they are installed, and even keeping them working is probably worth it at this point. But as to all of us just working in office buildings making legal and marketing decisions while all the work is done in factories in Asia and Mexico, I would be happy to pull the carpet out from under that whole thing.
She also called them children, and yet, you’re not pointing that out as a slur: “Gloria Steinem said women were immature!” Is that because even you are too embarrassed to yank that word so far out of its context?
You said that she and other feminists had called housewives parasites in the sense that they “don’t work,” because someone on this thread called you out for apparently saying that housewives don’t work. Gloria Steinem did not say that housewives don’t work, and, like I said, she has never derided the value of housework. You didn’t read the livejournal link, did you?
She says in the essay that housewives work, that they work hard, and that they deserve to be paid for their work. Why are you still pretending otherwise? Here’s how she characterizes the work women do in the same essay you quoted out of context:
In Women’s Lib Utopia, there will be free access to good jobs … and decent pay for the bad ones women have been per forming all along, including housework.
(snip)
The revolution would not take away the option of being a housewife. A woman who prefers to be her husband’s housekeeper and/or hostess would receive a percentage of his pay determined by the domestic relations courts. If divorced, she might be eligible for a pension fund, and for a job-training allowance. Or a divorce could be treated the same way that the dissolution of a business partnership is now.
See? She thinks it’s a real job that deserves real recognition and real compensation. It’s hardly a parasitic role in the sense of leeching off of someone without providing anything in return. By “parasite,” she was saying that women have no social standing as their own people because society sees them as incapable of independence–they are forced to cling to the men they marry. Men receive official payment and recognition for their work; women are paid “under the table” at the discretion of their husbands for the work of maintaining the household and raising the children. Legally speaking, women were parasites. They were maintained by their husbands, not compensated, just like the children she also compares them to.
There is no shame in doing valuable work despite not receiving any recognition. It’s not a slur to point out that women have fewer rights as partners, or that the work women do does not correspond to their social status.
We got slightly off topic defending feminists. :)
I want my own house. I want it to say that it is mine legally, I want the piece of paper saying I recieved the loan in my name, and I want the job that will give me the money to pay for the house. Perhaps, yes, it is selfish. I don’t care.
I don’t want to live with anyone else. I want my privacy, which is the point in buying a house in the first place. I want my own space to dance naked if i do so desire, and wander in whenever it suits my selfish little heart.
I want recognition in society that I am a productive member and that I have worth. The consumer culture is retarded, I’ll agree, but until it changes, I feel I deserve respect.
I don’t care if it’s more expensive (although, odds are, it probably isn’t). It’s security. If one has a house, one has a roof, one has colleteral, one has power of a sort. A house is more than a place to get away from the elements. A house conveys so much in society.
I want that, even if I am female.
>I want that
See, that’s what the problem is, that’s what Steinem caused by demeaning housewives and marriage. People should want to get married, not want their own house.
Sounds like someone needs another time-out.
Yeah, she’s a disgrace, all right. Doesn’t even plan to get herself a wife. Damn selfish equity-sucking ballbusters. How dare they opt into one of the most useful and reliable investments anyone can make? How dare they want independence and independent financial stability after centuries of being refused both?
Hmmm….house, husband….I’ll choose the house. If I had a husband, I’d just have to keep him in the garage anyway. The cats and I get the house.
Why, pray tell, should I want marriage? Why should I want such a liablity? Why shouldn’t I live life to the best of my abilities? Why shouldn’t I want my legacy to be my works instead of my family?
Defend marriage, defend “encouraging” traditional families. Why should I want them?
It would make me happy.
because it’s what we are supposed to crave, dream, fantasize about from the cradle…which is to ride off in the sunset with that perfect man, who will take care of us, rescue us and make our lives complete.
I guess Lubbuck got a double dose of this indoctrination.
I’m starting to think Lubbuck has tongue inserted firmly in cheek.
It would make me downright ecstatic to see Tom DeLay turn into a cockroach. That doesn’t make it right.
Feminism has been asking this question for decades now, but I’ll reiterate: Why should she or any woman put your happiness above her own happiness, security and autonomy?
I know, think of the poor cockroach! ;-)
Well, we’re here to serve men and all that. Lubbuck has apparently internalized all the patriarcal teachings and is unleashing them on women everywhere, in the guise of “helping” them.
You know, when men act sexist, and then say, but I’m civil, it’s called chivalry!
I’m very lazy, and apologize if someone brought this up and I failed to read it, but hurrah I say.
what the hell was the battle for property rights about if women can’t own the structure they live in?
Radfem, as a member of the pool of potential husbands, I firmly object to your division banishing us to the garage. Men as a group demand visitation of the cats.
I submit to you that cats are not in fact owned, as they do not accquiese to that system. as cats are communal property, you are allowed use an maintenence of a cat to improve your own experence with said mammal, but you gotta share.
I mean it. gimme the kitty. my landlord doesn’t allow pets, and I’m starting to get antsy.
You know, if people build new houses but the old houses aren’t torn down, somebody needs to buy the old houses.
Supply and demand, y’all.
Housing bubbles only happen when there are too many buyers chasing too few houses in a given location. But that doesn’t reduce the supply elsewhere.
See here’s the problem with people wanting to be married. If you want marriage for marriage itself, you’re going to end up with a sucky marriage. Far better to want to be with someone, then decide to marry. The marriage is merely a means to an end, not an end in and of itself.
I personally can’t imagine owning a house, but then I can’t imagine living anywhere for more than a few years at a time until I get my PhD (who knows when that’ll be). But still, three cheers to those who find a way to own their home, single or married, and that includes our gracious host, Ampersand, as well as Antigone. (as a Reed alum, there’s a special place in my heart for people who choose ancient greek characters or people as their screen names)
As annoyed as I am with many of Lubbuck’s comments, he does seem to earn some respect for owning up to the fact that he holds two seemingly contradictory views. (when I mentioned how cool it was that he seemed to be a conservative Marxist, I expected an adamant denial of anything related to Marxism. when he confirmed it, I was dumbfounded) But I do find a major flaw with his line of thinking. I mean, no one denies that if everyone were selfless everyone would benefit. But sooner or later someone will figure out that he/she’d benefit much more if everyone were selfless but her/him.
*bows* I also know where Antigone is from. Check this: My real name is Cassandra :)
>the fact that he holds two seemingly contradictory views.
The capitalists have set up the parties so that capitalism wins, no matter what. Either you support the corporate big government republicans with their tax breaks for the rich and cutting services that helped the poor, or you support policies that put work above family, increase sprawl and industrialization and technology of the feminist democrats, which is all stuff that relies on the same corporations. So we go in cycles of taxing the corporations, but increasing dependence on them, to giving them breaks while weaning ourselves a little. Those cycles actually help the capitalists make money, always shifting their puts and gets ahead of the rest of us, who just pay out constantly and absorb all the costs of the cycles. The blue-collar dems who support stability and marriage and family and keeping jobs meaningful and fair and here have no where to go – a huge voting block cynically chopped up by dividing us one minor issue at a time.
Housing bubbles only happen when there are too many buyers chasing too few houses in a given location
No, that’s what makes housing prices rise. Bubbles happen in part because people start speculating–they buy with the expectation that they will re-sell quickly for a profit. Eventually you reach a point where people can’t buy, or won’t take the risks.
Steinem never demeaned housewives and marriage–she, and other feminists, simply kicked the rock over and showed the contempt for married women and homemaking that always existed.
“People should want to get married, not want their own house.”
This is so frustrating. Why do you want to tell *other people* what they “should want”? Why is it your business? Do you think you can regulate their preferences?
My sister is a stay-home mom. I love her and respect her choice. Furthermore, I think she’s a very strong woman. But me, I hope to be a career bitch someday. Got a problem with that? She doesn’t.
Oh, and I already own my own home.
Okay, you addressed that already:
“Minding your own business is just self-interest. ”
Perhaps. And butting into everyone else’s business is just control.
I only answer to one God, thanks.
Personally, I find it a bit difficult to take a man seriously who doesn’t know the difference between “are” and “our”……but then again, I’m single happy, and own two homes….;-)
“Fitz Writes:
April 3rd, 2005 at 9:59 am
Oh, they have got homes & they have got jobs. (“careers”¿) I record numbers!
What they don’t have, (and what they say they want) our husbands and children.”
I bought my current house in 2000. Previously, I lived (platonically) and co-owned with another woman. Didn’t work out, so she bought me out after three years and I struck out on my own. My current dwelling is small and lacks much character (LaLubu, all the snobs here loooooooove Craftsman homes !! That’s why I could never afford one.), not to mention a dishwasher. Still, it’s mine.
When I purchased, the man I was dating made some noises along the lines of going in on the purchase with me. He was saying it to be polite. We had been dating for not quite a year. It would have been a big jump to go from dating to co-owning, and not one that either of us really thought wise. We’ll be getting married soon, after co-habitating since June 2001.
Interestingly enough, I was out in my front yard one Saturday about three summers ago when a couple of fifty-somethings pulled their car up to the curb, got out, and introduced themselves as my home’s original residents ! They were sisters in town for the Rose Festival. They had driven in from rural Washington and had hit on the idea of driving past their childhood home on their way back to Vancouver. So I gave them a quick look-see and they told me about their Mom, who had bought the then-new house as a young war widow with three kids, in 1950. I knew it was damn unusual for a woman to be able to do that back then, and said so. They told me that she was able to do it only because her own parents helped her put up half (!) the house’s total price as a down-payment ! (Under some similar rule, I would have had to shell out $41,500 for the place in 2000 !) That was the only reason the bank waived their usual policy of not selling to a woman unless she had a husband.
Gosh, I sure wish we still lived back in the good ol’ days. Yeah, right.