Renting a House - Cape Cod

When Thoreau went to walden, he had a serious mission statement. “I went to the woods because I wished to live deliberately, to front only the essential facts of life, and see if I could not learn what it had to teach, and not, when I came to die, discover that I had not lived. I did not wish to live what was not life, living is so dear; nor did I wish to practise resignation, unless it was quite necessary. I wanted to live deep and suck out all the marrow of life, to live so sturdily and Spartan-like as to put to rout all that was not life, to cut a broad swath and shave close, to drive life into a corner, and reduce it to its lowest terms...”

When we went to cape cod, our mission statement was a little more pragmatic. “we went to chatham because there was a house with a ping pong table, so if it rained or while we worked, the kids would have something to do.” I just searched for a place in chatham, called the owner Bob to reserve it with a day’s notice, and met him the following night with security deposit and week’s rent in hand.

Upon meeting bob, he pardoned himself as he put on a mask to protect himself from us new yorkers, and promptly showed us the house. I found out he had just come back from a three month stint in Thailand and Indonesia. He does landscaping work in Chatham during the summer, and has been going to south east asia for the past 20 winters. When I asked him where he stays in bali typically, he replied Ubud. It’s a touristy hub in the center of the island… so I immediately could imagine what type of traveler he was. Adventurous but not quite adventurous. On the walls of his house, pictures of his trombone band playing in chatham’s main park gazebo.

In searching for a place to stay, I didn’t know there was a ban against short term rentals in Massachusetts. It makes sense Massachusetts would want to limit migration of corona into their state. Being from new york, we were personas non gratas… purveyors of corona. Given his recent return from abroad, he may not have known about the rental restrictions. Or perhaps he knew about it, and just wanted the cash to fund his trips to indonesia.

A week later, when we tried to find other rental properties to extend our stay in cape cod further north, we received 20 rejections like this, “Massachusetts is under lockdown orders for short term rentals, which means we cannot rent out our properties until the order is lifted (hopefully in May). Visitors to the state must quarantine inside for 14 days per the governor's orders, as well.” For these law abiding residents, the fear of a $300 daily fine for renting illegally, or being blamed for hosting a deadly corona virus super spreader in their home outweighed their drive for profits. It was then we realized why Bob asked us to park our car at the bottom of the driveway when we first arrived-- so as not to arouse suspicion of his illegal short term rental activity. our orange new york license plates were not welcomed by his neighbors. Luckily for us, somehow when we searched for rentals, the first person we contacted was the only person in cape cod willing to rent short term illegally. Without this fateful unlawful transaction, none of our hikes and experiences would’ve transpired. so when we look back at our fond memories, we are thankful for bob’s avarice.

We found it eerie that in Bob’s driveway, there was a tombstone of Dr. Samuel Lord, the town's physician, who served nobly in caring for the sick before falling victim himself and dying of small pox himself on January 12, 1766. 37 people died in that epidemic. It was a reminder no matter how far we drove from nyc, there were reminders of plagues past and present everywhere. The reminders of corona virus frenzy were none so evident than the grocery stores and fish markets, where everyone wore protective masks and set up strict rules for circulating apart from each other within the stores. I was reprimanded more than once for walking callously around without a mask. I should’ve told these worry warts they had nothing to fear…. I had already gone through the engorged testicles corona fever thing. 

The other constant reminder of corona we had on our trip was that we were in cape cod in April… cape cod, till now was the memory of summers past-- the scent of sun tan lotion on beaches, long lines at roadside clamshacks, epic minigolf games, sweaty bike rides, sitting in the sand, watching baseball games, lighting bonfires, viewing seals, swimming clear fresh water kettleponds, and crabbing in tidal estuaries. Without summertime diversions, we walked the trails of cape cod and learned the essential facts of the cape. Cape Cod is only some 18,000 years old, but its history includes a vast collection of people, places and events, most from a time long faded into memory.