Our Own Front Door

How important is your house?
Very.
We've got to decide whether to stay in this flat -- or move soon.
Our lease is coming up in two months -- we've been here a year already -- and our landlord's agent has been writing, wanting to know what we're doing.
We're in a pretty spacious flat -- for London, I've got to admit -- a three-bedroom, two-bath place with a big master bedroom carved out of the attic.
But there's no outside space at all. And we live in an old house above an elderly woman and her middle-aged daughter, whose bedroom is just below the flat-screen TV in our living room. She feels the echo whenever we have the TV on. So we try not to have it on much.
And I don't like the kitchen.
We feel cooped up in here. No view out the windows.
Saw a little house the other day near here.
It's about the same size, maybe even a bit smaller, if you measured them up.
But it's a little house, with a front and back garden.
And it has a kitchen with not one, but two French doors, leading out to the garden.
And the garden is sweet, with a rectangular brick patio running along the back of the house lined by a decent patch of grass shaded by a big tree.
It's a little bit more expensive, but it's a nicer living environment. More open-plan, more of an American lay-out.
And it's got parking, which is good for my husband.
I'm working now.
So why not?
Suze Orman would tell you why. Haven't worked that much lately, actually. Been in Italy a lot with my son.
You need some outside space in life, I'm finding, just a tiny bit of Mother Earth to call your own.
If you've ever had it. You get used to it.
The best thing is we get our own front door.
Which is a great luxury. That I've missed.
Although it's more suburban like that, a little house, it's also more urban than here, closer to the high road, but in a quirky, more modern gated community of ten houses. Only a couple minutes from the nearest Tube stop though -- and newspaper.
And there's a mini-cab place just outside the gate, with all the drivers hanging out, which makes it kinda city.
But cool too.
I think we might be moving.
To make life nicer here. You need a place you want to call home.
But I hate moving.
And this will be my third move in 18 months.
Everything finally has its place here in this flat.
Took a year.