Househunting is dating, clairvoyants, memoirs and Kate Maxwell's Tufnell Park home
Welcome to Nesting issue #17
I thought I’d found The One last week. It wasn’t exactly love at first sight, but a lot of boxes were ticked. I felt a connection as soon as I walked through the door. We didn’t spend the night together, but I had a feeling it would be fun when we did.
Turns out, Rightmove is my new Bumble and I’m just as hopeless at it. Every day for the last ten months, I’ve swiped right on multiple houses and set up dates with the ones that look the most promising. And then I’ve waited for our first encounter and dreamt about our happy future together.
When we actually meet in real life, I studiously ignore the red flags for the first five minutes: ominous cracks in the ceiling, the third bedroom which is actually a cupboard or the fact that there appears to be an open grave in the garden (all recent examples). What the hell, we all have baggage, right?
And then later, as I walk home, I realise I feel relieved and a bit drained and I know it would never have worked out. And so I make my excuses and we never see each other again.
After a few days, I realise the house has disappeared from Rightmove, or nothing new comes along. And I start to think, ‘Was I wrong about that house?’ ‘Could I have actually just asked my guests to sleep in a cupboard?’ ‘Maybe the open grave would have come in handy.’ And I start a desperate campaign to get them back – but they’re gone. Snapped up.
And all the while – tick tock tick tock – my biological clo…I mean mortgage rates – are going up and up until soon I’ll miss out on my match all together. This all feels strangely familiar.
Where’s my Mr. Right(move)? And is there even such a thing? *
***UPDATE
No sooner had I finished this piece than I found The Actual One (house, that is). I’ve deleted Rightmove from my phone and finally committed. I’m all in. Wish me luck!
HOME COMFORTS WITH KATE MAXWELL
Kate Maxwell is the author of the recently released novel, Hush, about a 38 year-old expat who returns to London single and desperate for a baby. Can’t imagine why it appealed! But even if you can’t place yourself in the position of the protagonist quite as easily as I can, it’s still an excellent read which will both break your heart and mend it again.
Where do you live and how would you describe your home in three words? Tufnell Park, North London; pink and messy. I painted just about every wall Millennial pink recently (I like to jump on an interiors trend at least three years too late) as a soothing counterpoint to the chaos surrounding it: stacks of books, decorative nick-nacks I’ve picked up on holiday, children’s toys… I’m constantly stepping on Lego headlights and Nerf gun bullets.
Who is at home with you? My husband, stepson (17), daughter (7) and son (6). I’m hassled daily for a puppy but I feel as if I have two already.
Current Netflix/Amazon obsession? I’ve done all the good drama (I watch A LOT of TV), so while I wait for new series of Succession, The Split, and Call My Agent, I’m working my way through Netflix’s top lifestyle porn: Selling Sunset and My Unorthodox Life.
Best home comfort meal? Roast chicken every time – if I’m feeling fancy I’ll whip up a salsa verde to go with it. I’m also partial to Jamie’s saag paneer recipe, although the Millennial pink wall behind my cooker gets splattered in turmeric every time I make it, a cruel reminder that we should have splashed out on a splashback when we redid the kitchen.
Best section of the Sunday papers? The FT’s Life &Arts section is a brilliant mix of culture and columns. I start with ‘Lunch with the FT’ – whether they’re activists, authors or C-list royals, the interviewees are always interesting, as is their choice of pudding.
Book currently on your bedside table? A towering pile of books that includes Lessons in Chemistry – I’m interviewing its author Bonnie Garmus for the Firmdale Book Salon in September and it’s every bit as air-punchingly brilliant as I was expecting – and a This Works sleep spray. My husband thinks it’s snake oil and gets very irritated when I soak my pillow in it at 3am, but I’m convinced it does indeed work.
Background noise in your house? My kids’ (currently on holiday) make-believe games – there’s a lot of ‘pretend you’re a lion called Max and I’m your teacher...’ swiftly followed by ‘you’re the worst brother/sister in the world!’ and a fist fight I have to break up.
Bath or shower? Shower – it’s a great place to think; I often unpick plot tangles and kick badly behaved characters into line there.
Favourite house scent? The first coffee of the morning and the indoor geranium plant my sister-in-law gave me and is saving me a fortune in Daylesford Geranium Leaf candles, because it smells exactly the same.
My garden is…. concrete-y and full of pots – roses, agapanthus, cosmos, geraniums –but about to become a green oasis thanks to a local garden designer.
How well do you know your next-door neighbours? We have several close friends on our street whose children are friends with ours – we’ve been on holiday with two of them this year.
Your favourite home from home? New York’s East Village will always have a very special place in my heart – it’s where I lived in my early thirties and half my debut novel, Hush, is set there. I’d give anything to be sitting in Tompkins Square Gardens with a lox cream cheese bagel from Russ & Daughters and a couple of friends right now. Also Les Deux Tours just outside Marrakech, the perfect family-friendly hotel: a pool to die for, delicious food, and grounds with peacocks and goats that my children can roam solo – as a result I read an entire book the last time I was there, a holiday first.
Buy Kate Maxwell’s book Hush, here.
PODCAST STUFF
Desert Island Discs with Kate Moss
Kate Moss rarely speaks out in the media and so when she did Desert Island Discs a couple of weeks back, I popped in my AirPods and fell into a reverent silence. She doesn’t disappoint - there’s cocaine, there’s Jonny Depp, there’s Marky Mark and there’s her famed catchphrase, ‘nothing tastes as good as skinny feels,’ which would probably get her cancelled if she said it today.
TV STUFF
Uncoupled
Did everyone already know that Neil Patrick Harris was Dougie Howser, M.D.? I had no idea. Loved him in How I Met your Mother. And now I love him on Netflix in Uncoupled, as he comes to terms with the fact that his partner of 17 years has left him. I don’t think I’ve ever seen such glorious shots of New York from above – but that’s no surprise when you learn that this is the work of Darren Star – the producer behind Sex in the City.
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Thirteen Lives
I was feeling a bit blah when I watched this. And it totally de-blahed me. I’ve got so used to documentaries that focus on murder or con artists that I’d forgotten good people exist. Case in point - the heroic international efforts in 2018 to save 12 Thai boys and their football coach after they got trapped in a flooded cave. I cried. But in a cathartic way.
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Hollywood Medium with Tyler Henry
Not sure where to begin with this. Tyler is a Californian 20-something year-old who communicates with the dead. Hollywood A-listers invite him into their homes (half the joy) to deliver their messages, which invariably feel spookily on point. It’s as much about snooping around mega mansions as it is about clairvoyance – and as much about the living as it is the dead. Obsessed.
ART STUFF
I love art, but I’m a bit scared of it. That makes me a prime candidate for Interrupted Art, a refreshingly unsnobby new subscription service that aims to make art more accessible to all. Sign up and you’ll get a new new artwork hung in your home every ten weeks, plus the opportunity to buy it if you find you can’t live without it. I’m hooked.
BOOK STUFF
This is Not a Pity Memoir
I decided to treat myself to a new book in a desperate attempt to quit my terrible habit of falling asleep with my phone in my hand. I only bought it because I liked the cover – but I unwittingly picked a total gem, written by Abi Morgan, the creator behind TV shows like The Split and The Iron Lady. It’s about loss and illness, so it’s not a walk in the park - but it’s also a love story (and a life story) with a brilliant sense of humour.
On that note, I’m off to buy another book. Email me anything you recommend!
Dx
Who on earth is Dominique Afacan?
A very good question. Dominique (that’s me) is a writer, solo mum and sausage dog slave based in London. The idea for the Nesting newsletter came about because after ten years as a travel journalist, I wanted to share my new-found excitement about hanging out at home. I am also the author of Bolder – Life lessons from people older and wiser than you – a great birthday present, if I don’t say so myself – and available to buy here. Leap is my latest venture – it’s a new kind of social network that connects people in real time via hosted video conversations.
P.S The illustration for Nesting was created by my exceptionally talented friend Julia Murray in New Zealand.