Upon finding out that my house, which has been up for sale since August, is indeed going to close on a sale mid-November, I had to get busy getting serious about where I was moving.
You might wonder why I hadn’t already figured that out. Yes, I’d been looking for a long time. But one can’t move forward until one knows whether they are actually moving or not. It’s a nerve-wracking system. But that’s another future blog.
I had many choices on where to go—stay in Ashland or go out of town—live alone or with a group of other project-oriented friends and share resources. I decided the best thing to do was to expand my view, stay open, and see which one showed itself to be the one.
I looked on Craigslist again and saw something amazing. How did I miss this a few days ago? I replied immediately and then looked early in the morning to see if they responded, even though it was unreasonable to think that they would have seen my correspondence already.
Eventually I found a phone number and was able to get an appointment. An hour later I was out at the place and spent the whole time convincing the guy that he had to let ME be the one to rent it. Eventually he gave in.
My friend, Sierra, and I have been trying to come up with descriptives to do this place justice. It’s a combination of pirate ship, treehouse fort, playground/jungle gym, earthship/tiny house, and cat tree condo. I’m totally serious. 
The owner built this place out of recycled everything. It has 4 stories and only 400 sq. ft. of living space, but feels like much more. In addition to decks off of just about every opportunity, the first story has a kitchen, wood stove, and bathroom with clawfoot tub/shower and compact washer/dryer. The second has an office, bedroom, and secret hiding space. The 3rd level is a deck with big porch swing, and the 4th is a crow’s nest/tower for looking out 360 degrees. It’s got to be the best view in Southern Oregon.
But wait! There’s more! It has pulleys everywhere which open trap doors and has steam punk features throughout! Attached outside to the structure are 2 (or 3) fire poles, a playground slide from the 2nd to 1st floor decks, a playground swing at the front door porch, and, get this: a ZIP LINE that flies from the 3rd floor deck—above and across the vineyard—to the other side of the property!
And best of all, I can take Todd the Loverboy Cat there. I think he’s going to love it. Look for many video blogs from my new abode.
