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| OAKRIDGE, HERE WE COME! |
| Altogether I had spent eight years fighting the good fight for homeless people's rights in Eugene, and this came to a satisfactory conclusion in the camping program we finally won. So now it was time for John and me to move on to a radically new chapter in our lives, in which we would leave Eugene behind and seek a home in another Oregon town. Buying a house in the Eugene/Springfield area was out of the question for us, as the housing prices were hopelessly beyond our reach. So we set our sights on the economically-depressed town of Oakridge, a former logging community some 40 miles southeast of Eugene, where many more bargains were to be had. Of course, to go house-hunting we needed a financial boost beyond John's monthly SSD checks. This came from my father, in the form of a $10,000 pledge for a down payment as our wedding present. Our first attempt at homebuying in Oakridge came to a disastrous conclusion when the door was slammed in our faces at the last minute--but I won't go into that story here. Suffice it to say that the second realty agent we tried had more integrity. Especially after we told her about our experience with the first one, she was very careful to do the whole procedure legally and see that we weren't cheated this time. In this way we proved to ourselves that it is possible for homeless people to buy a home when they have but a small fixed income to work with. It's only a matter of finding a mortgager who is willing to work out a payment plan they can afford. Thus it was that we were able to buy the little bungalow pictured above. The closing date was August 31 (which was also, coincidentally, the deadline date for me to get my camper out of that parking lot!) This time everything went as it was supposed to, with no unpleasant surprises. We moved in on September 1st. Yes, this was really happening: our eternal homelessness had finally come to an end!!!!!! Now that we had at last attained "legitimate" housing status, we were next to legalize our domestic partnership: the wedding date was the following month. (click here for next page) |