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I Plan To Spend a Year Living in Airbnbs
A new adventure for a Type A writer/consultant and her cat! What could go wrong?
When I was small, kids around the way would smash glass bottles on the pavement and stomp on the shards. We lived in a hot city stripped of stars, and we thought diamonds on the walk would be the next best thing. We made what the city couldn’t give. A shimmering sky reflected onto the streets. Lucy in the sky with diamonds.
Come November I’ll wake to cold mountain air and sleep under the stars. I found my dream cabin…on Airbnb.
I spent this summer shackled in my apartment, subsisting on oatmeal and ramen — seized with anxiety over a paycheck that was held captive by a former friend and her business partner. Barely getting by with the small amounts they deigned to pay me. There I was, Oliver Twist with her empty bowl of food miming more. There I was, humiliated by someone I thought I could trust.
Who knows if we know the people we know. Most of us will commit our lives to the unpacking and vivisection of that knowing.
When I finally received payment from the thieving duo, a lease renewal notice was taped to my door. When one episode ends, another magically materializes — isn’t that always how it is? A walking Edward Albee play, where the…
