My beautiful pit bull Maisy is pretty much the light of my life. She’s a huge reason I tried so hard to establish a writing career; I couldn’t bear the idea of having to leave her every day to work an office job. Whenever I’d go out without her, she’d mournfully gaze at me with these soulful brown eyes, made almond shaped because of her kohl eyeliner–type markings, and I’d be overcome with guilt because I hated having her miss me. Whenever I’d leave the house, she’d be perched on the back of the couch, right by the door, waiting for me. The second she’d spot me on the sidewalk, her whole body would wag, like my coming back was the greatest thing to ever happen in her life. So now when people ask me why I became a writer, I tell them it’s because my dog was a nudge.
Anyway, every few weeks, she and I travel thirty miles up the expressway to the Veterinary Specialty Clinic in Buffalo Grove so she can undergo chemotherapy for mast cell tumors. Fortunately, we caught it early enough for treatment. She’s been in remission for a while and the majority of time she does very well, but when she gets sick, it’s very serious and very scary. If she didn’t have cancer, I’d be comfortable taking her to local emergency vets, but because she does, we go directly to her clinic. Over the past year, she and I have taken many snowy, white-knuckled, midnight rides.
Fletch and I find a map and draw a big circle around a ten-mile radius of the clinic and decide we’re living somewhere within those boundaries. We’re torn between two communities I know to be green and lovely, but what clinches our decision is Highland Park’s stance on pit bulls. In short, they don’t want them. In 2009 the mayor proposed bans on this breed, so even though it would be legal to have my dog there, [At least for now.] she wouldn’t be welcome. You don’t want my dog? Then you don’t get my tax dollar.
Ultimately we choose to search for homes in Lake Forest because I like lakes and I like forests and that place has both in abundance.
Of course, before anything can happen, we need a mortgage approval. With the way the lending market has been collapsing in on itself like a dying star, we’re not quite sure how this is going to work.
We had our own financial meltdown in the not so distant past, so we’re not ideal mortgage candidates, at least not on paper. For a bank to agree to lend us money, we’ve got to make a case for why we’re not the deadbeats our slow-to-improve FICO scores claim. [I’m not one to advocate anarchy, but sometimes I think Tyler Durden had it right.] Our friend introduces us to a broker and we meet him for lunch at a sushi place to discuss our situation.
Here’s the thing: I like sushi. I like it a lot and not just boring stuff like California rolls. Maybe I’m not at the Jeremy-Piven-human-thermometer-level of sushi lover, but I dig it. Raw halibut, flounder, trout, salmon, and tuna… if you roll it up in tobiko and dip it in eel sauce, I’m game. But anyone who’s ever been to a sushi joint knows that there’s one small, scary portion of the menu consisting of the superweird stuff that blurs the line between “fish,” “insect,” and “sci-fi movie mutant.” Yet when the mortgage broker suggests we order from the dark side, I’m all for it and I eat every bizarre bite that’s set in front of me, until we receive a big wad of raw quail egg–topped sea urchin.
“You might not like it,” cautions Ryan, our potential mortgage broker.
When the platter of what appears to be small tongues wrapped in seaweed and topped in ectoplasm arrived at the table a minute ago, I kind of gathered that I wouldn’t.
Yet if eating sea urchin is what determines whether or not I spend another year paying Dick rent, then sea urchin is suddenly my favorite dish. (Of course, Fletch is a culinary coward and sits out this round.)
I pick up the small, vaguely orange, tongue-shaped [With what appear to be taste buds and everything!] sea slug in front of me and I steel myself for what’s about to happen next. I approach the piece with an open mind, knowing that some of my favorite foods—foie gras, escargot, and caviar—gave me nightmares until I actually tasted them.
I stuff the sea urchin in my mouth and I have trouble chewing it because I’m unsure where my tongue ends and the sea urchin begins, not unlike when I’ve eaten dinner before all the Novocain wears off after a trip to the dentist. As the sea urchin lolls around my mouth, I feel like I’m being French-kissed by a Japanese fishing boat.
And the slimy raw quail egg? The texture does this bite no favors, either.
I do not love sea urchin.
I do not like sea urchin.
I do not want to put sea urchin anywhere near any of my orifices ever again.
Yet in downing it, I prove to myself that I can handle any food challenge were I ever to make it onto Survivor.
Also? I get us a mortgage.
Our friend is a Realtor here in the city and we ping her to help us find our new home. We want to buy a place so we can move before I leave for my book tour.
Not happening. [If you enjoy stories about idiots buying their first home and all the things that can go wrong, I humbly suggest you check out my first novel, If You Were Here.]
Since February, we’ve made three offers
