The first time I saw a house as a competition prize I laughed. What a thing, I thought! What a thing! I kept my eye out for more, and over the years they multiplied, the competitions now a little industry in themselves, newspaper pieces written about the winners, photographs of happy couples standing in the driveways of newbuilds holding large silver suitcases of cash. My friends enter the competitions wryly, ruefully, as if chucking coins into a fountain, why not?
Last week there was a big magazine piece where young New Yorkers were interviewed about their dream lives, then, looking at real estate listings and school fees and takeaway prices, calculated exactly how much such a life would cost. I am what I kindly choose to describe as a curious person – someone who peers quite deeply into lighted windows and the lives of others, and who subscribes to a number of publications that focus almost exclusively on walking the reader around strangers’ fabulous homes – so this magazine piece gripped me. While many of my friends find this practice (which includes time spent staring glazily at estate agents’ websites) vaguely sickening and morally weak, it relaxes me – I’m comfortable in that cold water, the vast moat between how we live, and how we thought we would.
