How to celebrate? endure? the 20th anniversary of 9/11? Buy an 18th century French chateau.
The chateau in question
Perhaps it’s an escape, but for this 20th anniversary, I’ve been fantasizing about buying a French chateau. Right out of left field. OK, this YouTube video may have had something to do with it. I’m a little bit in love with Phillip, the humorous film-maker behind the Vlog. He reminds me a little of Arron. Escapism? Projection? Nostalgia? Insanity? All of the above.
A few weeks ago, I was feeling a little more serious about the upcoming anniversary and wrote this essay on Medium. But as the day creeps up on me, I’m feeling the need to be frivolous and carefree and seek something that I can’t quite put my finger on. Something that perhaps I’ve been looking for for twenty years; something that I lost in those buildings that day. My sense of connection… or perhaps it’s my sense of reason that this world is beautiful and makes sense.
Arron brought a kind of zaniness to my life that’s been missing ever since. “Hey Ab, how would you feel about moving to Japan?” he’d come home saying one day. “OK,” I’d laugh. “I’m down.” I loved the projects we took on together and Phillip from YouTube and his wife, Anna remind me so much of Arron and I. And so those videos kind of slay me in a way. Remembering what I lost. And what I seek.
I have a distinct memory years ago of trying to imagine where I’d be on the 20th anniversary of 9/11. I couldn’t have begun to imagine that I’d be living in a firehouse in Seattle with my daughter who is attending naturopathic medical school, while my son, having recently graduated from college is living and working back in NYC. I love the firehouse, but I don’t know if it’s menopause or the pandemic or empty-nest syndrome or what, but for the past 3 years (since my breakup with Jim, I suppose), I’m feeling untethered and wander-y. Seeking a community. Or maybe just a partner in crime. I sort of have a community in Seattle, but well, the pandemic has decimated and defragged us. Friends have moved away or feel unreachable. Communing at coffee shops seems a long-distant memory. As much as I love the firehouse, I don’t have a community in this neighborhood at all.
And so I seek what I know is a complete fantasy of living in a far-flung country where the way of life is slower, the food is amazing and I live a more complete life than the one I am living here. I’m picturing myself hanging out with the locals drinking calvodos or aramanac or whatever local wine is available and eating bagettes and speaking baby French. I’m pretty sure I’m not alone in this little French fantasy. Aren’t we all looking for a place we feel we belong? Is France that place for me? Who knows?
I just gave myself a taro card reading which basically told me to go ahead and buy the chateau. It is my destiny.
Still fighting my inner logical self, so how about a poll?
A) Get real and stop fantasizing. There’s no possible way it makes sense for me to buy a chateau in France.
B) Book a trip immediately and go and check it out.
C) Buy the chateau sight unseen right this minute!
D) None of the above. Buy a Tuscan villa instead.
Welcome to my 20th anniversary insanity. Will this life every make sense?