Oh The Places I’ve Lived
A life in 15 homes
I’ve often looked up some of the old places I’ve lived, so I’m finally collecting them together, not to remember them later, but to remember them now. As I reflect upon my time in the real estate industry, and the stories behind where I’ve lived, here’s my life in 15 homes.
38 Homer Close, Rowner, Gosport, Hampshire (1973-~1977)
I have no memory of living here, and very few memories of what must have been several Naval married quarters homes we lived in before we moved to Somerton in connection with my Father’s posting at RNAS Yeovilton around 1977. This is the address listed on my birth certificate from St. Mary’s Hospital in Portsmouth, 30 minutes away.
17 Pinewood, Somerton, Somerset, England (~1977-1985)
This, and the house at Cary Way in Somerton, were the houses I grew up in. I have very fond, vivid memories of this house in Pinewood though. From learning to ride a bike in the cul-de-sac, to late summer nights outside playing with friends until it got dark, to harsh winters deep with snow, and even the prolonged power shortages and strikes of the late seventies. I used to walk home from school, and at one point, was even chased home by the local bullies.
The front yard used to be a lot larger, and extend a lot more into the main part of the street. I remember the ice-cream man coming round on a Sunday afternoon while we were watching the football, and getting an ice cream with a trading card in it. Our electric fire. The large picture of Stonehenge in the living room and the wicker furniture. Watching Kraftwerk on Tomorrow’s World. My bedroom was initially in the top right hand window, but at some point I moved to a larger bedroom facing the back yard, where I had a train set, my Star Wars collection, and Acorn Electron set up.
Cary Way, Somerton, Somerset, England (1985-1993)
A relatively new house for Somerton, I remember driving past what was to become of our house while it was still being built and watching the local kids there cycle around in the mud. The back bedrooms overlooked the beautiful Cary Valley, but my bedroom was the one in the top left at the front. I spent most of my teenage years here, including learning to drive (I once put the car through the fence on the left hand side, which you can still see the damage from). Much of the front of the house has been remodeled from when we lived there, including the removal of the beautiful bay window where our cat, Holly, used to sleep. The bus to school used to stop right outside our house, and when I lived here I used to work at the local newsagents, before taking a job in the local supermarket in Wells where I was an after-hours stock counter.
I once found the listing for our old house, and it looked as if it’d had a lot of changes made to it - the back garden had been ripped out, and there was no longer any grass, which always seemed like such a shame. Our next door neighbor was Cake Whisperer and Bake-Off favorite, Val Stones.
55 Grove Road, Surbiton, Surrey, England (1993-1994)
My first home away from home. I was relocated here by Kingston University to live with a young family, after not getting a place in the Halls of Residence at Clay Hill. I remember I had an argument with my Dad in the car on the day I moved there. I had my own bedroom in the back of the house, overlooking the back garden, and was able to cook and clean my clothes using their kitchen, but only when they weren’t using it themselves, so I often lived ‘around’ them. I wasn’t permitted to use the living room.
I never really got to know the family, as I spent a lot of time away from the house enjoying my new student lifestyle, and eventually moved in with some friends in a place of our own after the first term. As I got to know some of the other students, I often would spend the evenings at their houses instead, as guests didn’t really have anywhere to be where I was. I especially made friends with a house full of other art students in Surbiton - friends who became friends for life. I don’t remember the family’s name, but it’s a little strange to think that the young children who were in the house would be in their late twenties now.
19 Westbury Road, New Malden, Surrey, England (1994)
As is often the case with student living, I only lived here for about 6 months, with a good friend of mine from my fine art course, and 2 other business & finance students who we got paired with. It was pretty much a house of horrors, with slugs in the kitchen, holes in the walls, raucous upstairs neighbors and oversized skirting boards which hid a large number of construction shortcuts. We used to cycle over to the University, which got pretty old after a while, but it was here that I started to want to have the time and space to write, where my interest in transitioning over to the art history department took hold, and where I ultimately decided that I wanted to live on my own, something I ended up doing for the next 10 years.
64 Cranes Park, Surbiton, Surrey, England (1994-1996)
When I think of where I lived during my time at Kingston University, I think of this house. I lived in the converted attic at the top of the old house, which made for intensely hot summers, and freezing cold winters. I remember often waking up with dew on my face in the winter months. The small bedsit apartment I rented out there had no heating or cooling, a leaking ceiling, and the electricity and gas was run off a meter which had to constantly be fed 50p pieces in order to work. The shower was on the floor below, again run of a 20p meter, so you had to be quick. Next door to me on the top floor was a reclusive old woman who I was always friendly with but never got to know, and who always seemed to be falling - not surprising since the flat was on the 3rd floor. I heard many years later that she had died alone in her room.
The landladies were 2 local socialites, who had obviously gotten into the rental game to support their golf, gin and tonic and dinner party lifestyles. It was almost impossible to get a hold of them on anything other than rent day, which happened every 2 weeks. The check had to be left inside the flat for them to collect, which looking back seems incredibly invasive, and acted as a passive aggressive way for them to check that the place hadn’t been destroyed I guess.
This was an era before the web or cellphones, so there was a public phone on the ground floor, tucked away inside a small closet under the stairs, which was a nightmare for Paul who lived just outside where the phone was, as he was constantly having to either answer the phone for people, or get the door and run all over the house. In the lobby there was a shared table for everyone’s mail, and unless you were the one early enough to grab the mail from the postman, there was always the risk that someone would simply start reading your mail, especially if it was a postcard. I remember getting my postgraduate rejection and acceptance letters on that table very vividly. One floor down from me was an immigrant girl from Eastern Europe who worked in the local kebab shop and would take care of me with extra helpings of chips whenever I went there after the student bar. I often wonder whatever became of the people who lived in that house, and if some of them might even still be there. I wasn’t close with anyone else who lived there, but I’m still curious as to what happened to them.
The front of the house today has been remodelled from what it was when I lived there - the front of the house is now tiled and paved, whereas before it was a garden with enormous trees, a small garden and a small path between the road and the house. Despite all its shortcomings, and the low-fidelity lifestyle it offered, I’ve very fond memories of living here, and I was able to do an enormous amount of reading, writing and learning in that little flat. I was sad to leave it at the end of my time in Kingston, but excited for the unknown of what was to come in Holland.
Jan van Eyck Akademie, Academieplein 1 & Kamerburo Student Housing, 100 Brouwersweg
Maastricht, The Netherlands (1996-1998)
My experience of living in Holland is probably best described as nomadic. Even though I rented an apartment in shared student accommodation in a soulless, dirty converted hospital (that had really wide, heavy doors everywhere), I was rarely there. I was best described as being there on paper perhaps. Even though most of my work was digital, I was fortunate enough to have an enormous sculpture studio to work out of at the academy itself, so while I often locked myself away in the computer studio during the day and work long into the night, I’d essentially just stay there for months at a time, living out of my studio, the mezzanine of which I’d converted into a bedroom and living space. I was able to cook, shower, do laundry and pretty much anything else you’d need to do domestically, all from within the academy itself. There was always the threat you’d be ‘found out’ that you were always staying over, but it was more of an unspoken rule rather than anything anyone really enforced. I had a key to the academy so I’d come and go whenever I wanted, and it afforded me a wonderful, creative, industrious lifestyle.
My days often consisted of getting up early, slipping out the academy’s back gate before the staff arrived, and visiting the bakery across the street just as it opened for the morning, where I’d get ‘2 and 1’ as the baker described it in his primitive English. ‘2 and 1’ referred to 2 chocolate croissants and 1 regular croissant’, which were amazing having just come out of the overnight oven. I’d then ‘arrive’ at the academy, sit and read the paper over breakfast with a coffee (drunk out of a bowl), and then open up the computer studio as I had a key to that too. I’d work solidly through the morning, and only sporadically take the time to go to any of the lectures that were held around the academy. Then lunch back in the studio, which was usually a waffle and some milk, followed by working straight through to around 6pm, when a few of us would head next door to the Maastricht University cafeteria and grab some inexpensive student dinner. Sometimes we’d also head off into the city for dinner at a cheap Indonesian restaurant. Sometimes we’d stay out all night, but more often than not we’d head back to the academy and just keep working. Oh, to have that time and space back.
66 Cranes Park, Surbiton, Surrey, England (1998-1999)
When I moved back to London after my time in Holland, I moved next door to where I’d previously lived when I was a student. Same landladies, same small flat, same waking up with dew on my face, although this time I was in the corner room on the second floor (the one with the windows open and the red brick exterior). It was smaller than my bedsit next door had been, and I was never happy there, even though I knew it was temporary while I looked for a job, and enough money to be able to afford a place of my own. After my nomadic existence in Holland, I’d vowed to never live like that again, and the flat at 66 Cranes Park was to be the last place I’d ever compromise on. I used this flat to get back into the swing of things after being away for two years, and settled back into life in London, catching up with old friends, going on job interviews, and using my time to apply for jobs and tighten up my portfolio.
I never got to know anyone who lived in the many other flats in that house, but I do remember the police knocking on the front door late one night looking for someone who lived in that building, which was never a good thing. I started working, earning, and saving, and by the time I got the full-time job at QVC, I saved up enough over 2-3 months, and moved out into a place that was truly my own as soon as I could.
50 & 62 Cedar Terrace, Richmond, Surrey, England (1999-2001)
I lived in two apartments during my time in Richmond, and I loved them both. The first one, at 50 Cedar Terrace, was really my first ‘place of my own’, and I’d vowed never to live like a student ever again. My agreement with myself was to spend as much as it took out of my paycheck to make that happen. I’d looked at a few places in Putney prior to moving to Richmond, which I’d always thought was out of my price range, but I found a great letting agent, who helped match me with the perfect place - something I’ll always be grateful for. I remember moving in, and having one of the best night’s sleep I think I’d had in years. I didn’t have to share the shower with anyone, the refrigerator was all mine, and if I wanted to just spend the day in my pajamas, I could.
Specifically, I remember working late and designing the QVC Directory at 50 Cedar Terrace, while listening to the first Rufus Wanwright album and lots of Fiona Apple. I also played a ton of Playstation in this apartment as well - mainly Metal Gear Solid, Tekken 3 and WipeOut. Alas, as with all rentals, there was the frequent spectre of the landlord not renewing the lease, and I was only there for about a year before the landlord decided he wanted to sell, causing me to have to relocate again.
Thankfully, I only had to move a few doors down to number 62, where again I lived on the top floor, in a slightly bigger place. It was here that I also bought my Mini Cooper, as the train commute was getting more and more ridiculous, something I’d later experience over many years with the New Jersey Transit.
530 South 2nd Street, Philadelphia, PA (2002-2004)
My first home in America. I’d relocated to Philadelphia for work in early 2002, and found a wonderful little apartment in Center City Philadelphia. It was similar to where I’d been living in Richmond, with a single bedroom, living room, bathroom, walk-in closet, kitchen and a small balcony. I drove back and forth from work in Chester County at QVC about 45 minutes away, and was always much happier to be home than at work.
I loved exploring the new city, with the TLA and several other music venues only minutes’ walk away. An English pub across the road, where I’d later meet my wife during a drunken 30th birthday party. The Wawa downstairs for late night snacks. Chinese delivery and shopping at the insanely expensive Italian deli down the road. Record shopping on a Sunday afternoon at SpaceBoy and Repo Records. Road trips to Atlantic City, New York and The King of Prussia Mall.
In the later time I lived here, I’d changed jobs but was still reverse commuting to Horsham, and eventually back and forth to New York, often in a single day on the Acela Express, which proved exhausting, and I’d often spend my weekends physically recovering from the grueling routine. Ultimately all the back and forth to Manhattan ended up with the offer to be relocated to New York, something I couldn’t resist, much as I loved, and still love, Philly. We still visit Philadelphia, and have many friends there. For everything that’s happened since I lived here, this was one of the places that has always truly felt like home.
322 West 57th Street, Manhattan, New York (2004-2006)
Thankfully, my first and only experience with the New York rental market. I moved here on May 6th 2004, the same evening as the Friends finale, which was being shown on a jumbotron in Times Square as I walked from Penn Station to my new home. I lived on the 10th floor of The Sheffield building on West 57th Street after moving from Philadelphia, again for work. It was a small open plan studio apartment, with a separate kitchen and bathroom. I watched the neighboring Hearst Building’s construction from below my window, to across from my window, to above my window in the space of the first year I was there, and by the time the employees had moved in, I could clearly see them, and they could clearly see me, so from then on the blinds were always closed.
Food from the nearby Gristede’s had to be carried home, as I’d sold my Jeep before moving to Manhattan, so I only ate what I could lift, plus everything was exponentially more expensive than I’d been used to. This was the only place I’ve ever been able to walk to work, something that was incredibly romantic during the first few weeks I lived here. Across the street was an Irish pub, and a Chinese restaurant with incredible delivery food. A block away was a great bakery, a sushi restaurant, and of course, a McDonalds. 2 blocks away was the site of the original Soup Nazi kitchen from Seinfeld. I’d spend a lot of my weekends exploring the city’s comic book stores, and just acclimating to life in Manhattan. Going to the big museums, art galleries, and department stores.
It was also here that I started to date Mary, who’d often come over on the bus from Weehawken and hang out, where we’d cook, watch old movies, go to shows, and explore the East Village together. The bus used to drop her off at 41st and 8th Avenue, which was a large construction site at the time. Little did I know that ten years later I’d be working in the building coming out of the ground there - The New York Times.
63 Paterson Avenue, Hoboken, NJ (2006-2007)
After dating for a while, we’d gotten engaged in Cape May, and shortly afterwards Mary and I decided to move in together in Hoboken, a town we’d often hung out in, and where her brother lived. It was central to where we’d both come from - me from Manhattan, and Mary from just up the hill in Weehawken. We lived on the second floor, in a small 1 bedroom apartment with 2 small offices, a living room, the world’s smallest kitchen, and a miniscule bathroom. We lived above a musician and teacher, Patrick, on the first floor, and a homeless guy, Frank, who the landlord had taken pity on and allowed to live in the basement. Mary was teaching while we lived here, and would often leave the house before me.
The landlord ran the neighboring Iron Works, and we always suspected he had connections around town, something that’s reinforced whenever we drive by the building which is still standing there defiant in the face of Hoboken’s perpetual gentrification and new development. I found out after we’d left that he’d attempted to take us to court for the cost of repairs to the apartment as he’d claimed we had damaged parts of the entry hallway, something that never formally reached us, but always left a bad taste in my mouth. I’d walk to the Path train and head over to Manhattan for work, eventually, and thankfully, transitioning from the music industry to the real estate industry during the time we lived here. My office was the room in the top left hand corner. It was here that we adopted another cat, Abby, who still lives with us today. Mary’s cat Maya had moved with her, but sadly passed away earlier this year in 2019. We miss her.
I remember the deep snow, the entire apartment shaking whenever a truck went past outside, trying to park in the driveway, trying to avoid the basement’s homeless guy whenever we wanted to do our laundry, working on a ton of Algorithm projects, and all the financial stress of buying our first place. I remember how heavy the comic book boxes were to get down the stairs. We were also prepping for our upcoming wedding, so the last 6 months of living here were very hectic. We were so happy to leave here, and I remember loading up Mary’s Saturn with as much as we could fit into it, and slowly moving our things from Hoboken to Denville.
39 Cooks Road, Denville, NJ (2007-Present)
This photo was taken the day we bought our house, October 2007
The place we call home, and will always call home. Out of all the places I’ve lived, this is the place I’ve lived in for the longest continuous amount of time. While we’ve lived here, we got married, welcomed our beautiful daughter Emma, our beloved dog Harley, several fish, and our two new kittens, Freda and Macy. We’ve survived hurricanes, floods, severe snow, falling power lines, trees coming down, oil spills, leaking utilities, and even cancer here. It’s an old house, but we’ve poured so much love into it over the years, from converting the basement into a man cave, to all the work we did in the yard, restoring the kitchen from it’s seventies glory to a modern working space, several rounds of living room and kitchen furniture, and much more.
We love the wood burning stove, which is amazing with Netflix and a glass of red wine on a cold Sunday afternoon in the fall, but we always miss being able to sit out on the deck in the summer and light the fire pit. Our neighbors look after us, and we look after them. We’re connected to the community, and are often local trivia champions. Several jobs have come and gone here, but this has always been a constant source of security and happiness for us. It’s a long way from a tiny flat in Gosport.
