Peoples Republic of South Devon

Where the heart is?

March 15th, 2008

posted by Jess Sains

Last week my local paper, The North Devon Journal, had an article about our village. It centred on an application to build 14 ‘affordable’ houses and a half sized football pitch for the kiddies. Today, certain broad sheets have articles about a street in Pontefract, South Yorkshire, where one can still buy a home for around £25,000. Yesterday the People’s Republic of South Devon took a look at housing developments in Exeter. The whole country trembles, in budget week, wondering if we are on the brink of a market collapse, which will leave many paying off huge mortgages on houses now worth much less than they paid.

An English person’s home is their castle. Castles are big news these days…

Living in the South West we in Devon have all seen house prices rise to an incredible average price of £249,890 and in the South Hams the average is even higher. Young people rely on parental assistance, first time buyers struggle, other borrow hundreds of thousands of pounds in credit to secure their own little piece of Devonshire. We risk debt and bankruptcy, thunder about the annoyance of second homes, pay over the odds all for a home, a property.

Almost from birth we are taught that home means security, safety, warmth. Initially represented by our parents and their love, it then becomes a symbol of our own maturity and independence and finally a place where we replace our parents become partners, couples, pet owners, parents and grown-ups.

Home is where the heart is. Get through the door and shut out the world. I’m home safe and sound. I just want to go home.

Our society is placing an ever increasing emphasise on what is generally the most expensive thing a person will ever own. Even if you have nothing else you have to have a home of your own. One could, cynically, say that the government, the banks and capitalism at large are all assisted greatly by the fact that we all have to earn to own a home in this market, have to continue to earn to continue to pay our large mortgages. That more couples are forced to both work, undermining once again the importance of the role of those that stay at home and pushing most children in to one system of education at the same time. One could say that working is what keeps most people most busy and we do it al to maintain the money flow that gives us our stability, our home.

Or, one could say that we all require heart, beating away, to live and our homes help us maintain that.

Perhaps the truth is somewhere in between the cynical and the sentimental. She writes, sitting in her house, in a beautiful village, full of middle class people, where they have to fight to build affordable homes…

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Entry Filed under: Society