I received a really great email from Deleted Scenes reader and subscriber Sarah Neilson, reacting to my recent piece “More on Pro-Family Urbanism.” That unassuming headline is from when I thought it would be a brief little post, but it got pretty long, and it quickly became one of my most-read pieces. It also received, to my memory, more comments than anything else I’ve published here.

I asked Sarah if I could publish her email as a guest post, and she agreed. Below is her email, very lightly edited.

Yes on this. I’m likely one of your most leftist/liberal readers, but I can’t imagine being truly divided over anything you say here. When it comes to apartments, you’re one of the only people I read whose assumptions aren’t baffling to me. My grandmother lived in an absolutely beautiful building on St. Charles Avenue in New Orleans for my entire life before she passed away at age 99 two years ago; I’ve never associated “apartment living” with anything like downmarket options or deprivation.

The first apartment in my life had a doorman and an incredible front desk staff, a mirrored elevator, and a pool on the roof that was often vibrantly enjoyed by small children. I’m veering a bit off topic here, but I guess it’s to add a sort of American equivalent to your observations about families in Croatia. [See some of that here.]

More immediately to the point re this newsletter, though: what stood out to me most was your observation, one I rarely see made, that young child-ed couples’ lives could be made unimaginably easier by having the option to forgo the car entirely. My sister-in-law and her husband, who are in their early 30s, just had their first child a year ago, and the ordeal of strapping this baby into the carseat has been a hellish endeavor for all involved, even though their son is remarkably behaved and adaptable.

I’ve actually just noticed this discrepancy as I wrote that now: their family life is, some inevitable sleep interruptions notwithstanding, generally peaceful, except where the car is concerned. I remember her specifically saying, when the baby was probably 4-5 months old, that if they can successfully get “out to Target” as a family without incident, it feels like an unparalleled triumph.

As I think about this more, the only times they seem to have truly struggled with their son—as in sustained bouts of crying and distress—involve getting him into the car. He recently took two flights and was said to be entirely comfortable and calm on the airplane. But that carseat struggle, as you so aptly put it, wears everyone down, the baby included. I’ve never seen urbanism presented as, “Life free from this.”

If they had any amenities that allowed for them to take shopping trips on foot, I know they would use them. I can’t imagine how much more energy they would all have. We’re in California, where zoning laws are absolutely absurd and property laws are exclusive by design, and homeownership means gigantic house, certainly if you have children but in a lot of cases even if you don’t. Apartments seem to signal the downfall of a neighborhood in most people’s minds, something that no one would actually want, and that brings me to a story I’d almost forgotten that might interest you.

Two years ago, we were living in a small town in the Sierra Nevada called Placerville, a rural experiment that ultimately failed: it’s a fascinating place to walk through, surrounded by green mountains, but it’s also fanatically libertarian and not, it turned out, a place my partner or I wanted to live.

[Placerville looks like this; photo credit Ian King]:

But we had a charming apartment remodeled by, significantly, a landlord who was not American and understood the aesthetic possibilities in apartments. (I think he’d originally come from Singapore, where beautiful apartment buildings abound, so he’d fitted the place with a glassed-in shower and up-to-date kitchen, while the floors were a mix of elegant hardwood and the original 1920s tiles.) That was one draw to renting from him.

But the other draw was that we were right on Main Street, walking distance from shops and cafes, pretty much everything there is to do in Placerville (other than hike). This made things wonderfully walkable for me when I wanted to get writing and other work done around other people.

But when I answered the question, “What’s your address?” this would inevitably happen every time:

“Main Street?” they would repeat, skeptically.

“Yes,” I would answer.

“You live ON Main Street?”

“Yes.”

It was clear that they didn’t totally believe me, so I’d have to name the restaurant next door and the bead shop we lived above.

“I had no idea there was an apartment in that building,” I heard from several people.

Admittedly, the place was small, but it was enough space for both of us and had wide windows looking out into the mountains. It was not a compromise. Living with more space than we needed, for more money, far away from everything when I don’t drive? That would’ve been the compromise.

Related Reading:

Rural New Mexico Blues

Spread Out or Smashed Together?

Have You Ever Seen a Nursery Like This?

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