I live in what was supposed to be our "starter house" -- you know, the house you don't intend to stay in forever-- the investment property. We had a 5 year plan which is now apparently our 10 year plan, and the way the market looks these days, it might in the end become our 15 year plan. There are a thousand analogies that keep popping up for me, proving daily that I am obsessing over this issue in my life. (Yes, I refer to the housing situation as an "issue"). The average house in my neck of the woods is running about $650,000 - $800,000. This is great news if you are a Realtor. Unfortunately, I am not.

Our home isn't all that bad. It's a suitable size and functions well for us. I am actually embarrassed to admit to my bad attitude. The issue at hand is that I do not love my home. I've never really loved it. It was meant to be temporary. I figured it would do for a while, and we would move on. I never put down roots. The neighborhood is full of people like me -- temporary. We are at the low end of the housing market in here, and everyone seems to buy with the intention of using this piece of real estate to get a step up. The trouble is that step keeps getting steeper and steeper. The only way to cash in on our nest egg would be to leave the area -- or to commit to a half a million dollar mortgage.

To top it all off, our neighborhood is a little dicey. We are a mixed lot. The higher the housing market soars, the more families we see crowding into one home. After all, we are the cheapest homes for miles, and at $550,000 per unit, we're running about $180,000 per bedroom. The cute little kids riding bikes on the cul-de-sac are now teens hanging out on the street corner under the street light. Paint ball guns have given way to Air soft and BB guns, street games have started to turn to battles. My attitude has been, "just put the house on the market. We'll cash in the equity and buy new." Sounds easy enough. I've given in. I'm willing to pay $3000/month to get the hell out of here.

You may think that no one in their right mind would pay over a half a million dollars for an attached home in a dicey neighborhood with gang problems. Guess again. At that price we are the cheapest square footage in town. Houses last a day on the market. And people are fighting to get one. Sound crazy? You betcha. Sometimes truth is stranger than fiction. You can put whatever price tag you want on this place, I still don't like it very much, but I'm beginning to see a higher meaning in it all.

In an obscure passage in "the Lake of Dead Languages", Carol Goodman refers to a home she used to visit as a child as "looking unloved". This phrase in that context leapt out at me. I've been living in an "unloved" home for quite some time -- and I suddenly wondered if it showed. This has been a common theme for me since arriving in California. I am only visiting this planet. I hate this attitude in me. I ask for forgiveness regularly. I ask for a grateful heart. Contentment. But still I'm whining....

Since reading Carol's great book, I've seen "My Life as a House" and "Under the Tuscan Sun". I have to say that given the ongoing theme in my life, both these films moved me. I loved the reconstruction analogies, the restoration. Again, I was inspired to ask for divine intervention -- I want to love where I live. My primary instinct is to go find that place, but I know that it is my heart that requires the reconstruction. Like Rep Tevya in Fiddler on the Roof, I am tempted to ask for more -- wouldn't my task be a bit more palatable if I was in a Tuscan Villa? Wouldn't it be an easier house to love? No, the answer comes clearly, my unkempt heart would follow, and even the Tuscan Villa would pale.

After reading Will Sansbury's recent blog on Christians in Public School, I realized that this attitude is all too common in the Christian community. Somehow we've grown to see Life as a sort of Ellis Island. We are held up on this smelly rock, awaiting the processing of our papers so we can get on with it. This place is damned, the people smell bad and speak strange languages and have all sorts of heathen habits -- it is a purgatory of sorts. We are heaven bound. Just hang in there and this unpleasantness will be over soon. Don't let your children touch the foreigners -- you don't know what they might catch! (So ugly -- so sorry).... Life as a starter home -- temporary -- in a dicey neighborhood.

Yet life is a gift. A very expensive one. And even the "least of these" lives is likened unto Jesus Himself. Maybe it doesn't always make sense -- but it rings true deep down in me in a place that seems ancient. Maybe my tiny half a million dollar attached home in a neighborhood on the edge is an example of something much bigger. I'm beginning to see the big picture.

I won't be able to finish this story today. But I will tell you enough to start you praying. And I really hope you will be praying. Fighting has escalated. There are weapons (no real guns yet, but knives, I am told.) The final straw for me was the sound of glass breaking. I chased them away and was left cleaning up broken wine cooler bottles. The kids I was chasing are all of 12 and 13 years old. Police have been called on multiple occasions by multiple families. Hateful things have been said. There has been yelling, name calling -- patrolling. Two Sundays ago, we decided to take the corner for Jesus. (yes, I know I sound like a freak). Don't ask me how I came to this conclusion. It seemed right. My kids and a neighbor boy prayed for the corner. We prayed for the "bad kids" and we prayed for the "good kids" on the edge of being bad. We prayed for our corner. My daughter wrote in sidewalk chalk "Jesus loves you". We decided we needed to keep that message on the sidewalk for a while. My son said, "they'll probably think we're nut jobs and will stay the heck away from our corner." Maybe he's right. Whatever works.

All I know is this: I've been noticing how pretty the hills look around my house lately. The sky is so very blue here. And at night you can smell the jasmine and the citrus blossoms....