After being under-employed for most of the last two years, I have a steady part-time job and some freelance work that means I can afford to pay somewhere less than $800/month for rent. There are places in Athens that would fit my budget, but none of them are available in my research until the summer or fall because of the fucked-up school-based leasing schedule that rules the entire town. I also still don’t have a car, so until I get one, it would be a major pain to go too far out from a central location.
What do I do if I literally can’t find a place I can afford to live in this town? Moving to another city would almost certainly be more costly, and I don’t want to do that anyway. I’ve been fortunate to have a few different people let me stay with them rent-free (or rent-deferred) at different parts of this year. I don’t have any potential roommates at the moment, which is the only way I’ve ever afforded to live anywhere in my adult life.
I started imagining what it would be like to make enough money to pay more in rent, for a well-lit loft that I could live in by myself, to have enough money to decorate in a way I might like, rather than living in yet another dingy old southern house with a minimum of mismatched furniture that I’ve cobbled together over the last decade from thrift stores and hand-me-downs. It filled me simultaneously with a light of hope, to envision this thing that has never been possible for me, and then the inevitable shadow of disappointment that it will still never be possible. I’ve only briefly been able to fully-embrace anywhere I’ve ever lived as an adult; I’m so tired of having no home, let alone a more-permanent place I can care about and invest in rather than just inhabit briefly and reluctantly.
What do I do if I can’t find somewhere to live?