I did it. About three years ago. I found it, and I did it.
For centuries it has been debated, questioned, sought after, and feared. The edge of the world. The place where the oceans broke over the edge of the final frontier, descending in endless torrent, dragging every hapless ship and voyager to the churning void of the underworld. Odysseus, Columbus, Magellan all warned against this. Death would be their fate.
I found it. I bought it. And I now live there. About 2 miles past the edge of the world. But the edge of the world isn’t where everyone thought it was. It is a grey patch in California. About 20 minutes from anywhere anyone would know. People who live 21 minutes from this grey patch don’t know it’s there. “Where do you live” they ask, and after describing where I live, and I am met with the same blank stare. “Where?”
When my wife and I first saw the post for the house, we saw the picture of the traditional home on a realtor’s website. There was a button to click to find it on the map. We clicked it. Screen was filled with an empty grey grid. We clicked “satellite view” the screen was filled with the brown yellow blur of central coast burnt summer grass, and blotches of drying oak trees… no house. “Where?”
Then we bought it.
Electricity can’t find us here. Water pipes can’t find us here. Sewers can’t find us here. Trash trucks can’t find us here. GPS shrugs and gives up about 2 miles before you get here. We are off the grid. Off radar. Off the edge of the world.
What does find us here is sun. What does find us here is light, the stars, and the moon. And a mad collection of people who also chose to live out here in this grey patch on a map 20 minutes from anywhere.
I love it.
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