We've been chasing stability for so long that we almost forgot what it felt like to want something simply because it was good.
It started when our youngest was one year old. Leukemia. Our lives became hospital hallways overnight. My wife left her career without a second thought — she's been his full-time caregiver ever since. I don't have words for what that kind of quiet strength looks like up close. I just try not to take it for granted.
Then I lost my job. My entire department, gone. For two years I tried to make it work where we were, close to family and everything we knew. But the work wasn't there. We packed up and moved to a province we'd never planned to live in, because it was the only way to give the boys something resembling a normal life after years of medical and financial chaos.
We've been renting since. Last month our landlord raised the rent \$600 a month. Just like that. It was a reminder that as long as someone else owns the walls around you, your peace of mind belongs to them too.
Our boys have watched us pack boxes their whole lives. They've gotten good at it. Too good.
Then we walked into this house. The boys went straight to the backyard. They could already see themselves there — summer, pool, years of it. It was the first time in a long time that the future felt like something to move toward instead of something to survive.
We're first-time buyers. We've never caught a break that didn't come with a cost. But I keep thinking about that backyard. About the look on their faces.
That's the whole story, really. That's what a house means when you've spent four years in an oncology ward wondering if you'd ever get to worry about something as ordinary as a mortgage.