On April 2, 2022, I boarded an Amtrak train–Vermont bound. Despite all the warning signs to not relocate to Vermont, I went anyway. With an injured right foot and oversized travel bags, I arrived in Brattleboro only to encounter the height of an opioid epidemic and a housing crisis. And no matter where I traveled in Vermont–from Brattleboro to Wilmington to Montpelier and Burlington, the story was the same, “No rental leases available.”
I found work writing for magazines and newspapers, but my dream was to work as an animal communicator. Despite my efforts I never found a long-term rental which caused me to deplete my bank account renting hotel rooms and vacation apartments. I even stayed at a homeless shelter for one night and that was when I decided to leave Vermont–nearly penniless and suffering from chronic Lyme disease.
I wrote this memoir from an apartment in northwest Pennsylvania. My hero’s journey is paralleled to The Wizard of Oz. I also learned that there is no place like home at a time when finding any home at all has turned into a lottery of broken souls.
#pursuingdreams, #Vermont, #housingcrisis, #memoir #greed #politicalcorruption
belleauthor (Patricia Herlevi) 