what purchase meant the most to you?

“what purchase meant the most to you?”

〰️

“what purchase meant the most to you?” 〰️

context: at this time, I had just been released from the mental health intensive care unit at Laurel Ridge in San Antonio. I was largely homeless, in and out of apartments, and losing a little bit of the few things I actually owned every time I moved (to include my cat- later story).

I had an instinctive, strong urge to settle down somewhere set- somewhere non-mobile, where I could build roots. This is partially due to the fact that up until my hospitalization, I had been living in my upcycled vintage Airstream trailer for over a year. Part of my mixed episode in December of 2020 included driving (and hauling ) the trailer with all of my belongings in it from Texas to Colorado to escape my life that had formed in Texas. I was trying to run away from my baby- but that ended up being hard to do since she was inside me, all the time, a constant reminder.

So when I returned to San Antonio in January of 2020, at this point I was out of the full time hospitalization program and was on the partial program. I was about 6 months pregnant at this point, and desperately trying to find a home. Unlike my past 11 years of existence, having no roots anywhere and adamantly claiming I would never ever buy a house of my own, the only thing I wanted to do was astonishingly- buy a house. So I started searching.

I found the perfect home in a small town called Castroville, just south west of San Antonio, going towards the desert of West Texas that I absolutely love. The town prided itself in being a miniature Alsace-Lorraine, complete with the old German architecture and cottage style buildings. The house I found was perfect. It was a historic home which meant it would only increase in value over the years- and it was the perfect amount of space. At the time, I was planning on my mother coming to live with me to help me get through the birth of my baby girl. This ended up not being the case (another story).

This post was written before I slipped into another episode that led me to (stupidly, idiotically) pull out of the contract to buy the house last minute due to my commitment phobia. I thought the home and the town was perfect. It might have been so, and I might have been able to adjust to the small town life with my baby as a single mum. But that was not meant to be (considering I now live in the heart of southern downtown San Antonio) but nonetheless, represents a moment in time when I felt so close to being rooted.