I have committed to living one year in a home I have not yet stepped foot in. I have seen it only in pictures and videos, narrated by the man who found the space: my boyfriend Michael.

There may be some women’s lib people out there who are a bit stunned or put off by this. But for this woman, it was kind of wonderful to not have to do any of the searching nor visiting nor negotiating.

Not to say Michael picked this place without my input. We had, earlier, talked about the “must-haves” for each of us. I wanted a place where I could head out my front door and  go for a walk. Which Michael said was pretty much any place. “Yeah, but I don’t want to walk down the side of a highway,” I explained. My dream was to be within easy walking distance of restaurants and coffee shops and a supermarket. “And what do you consider ‘easy walking distance’ these days?” Michael asked. A valid question considering I was, at that moment, walking 12 miles per day across Spain. “Fifteen or twenty minutes,” I said, “Less than a mile.”

I later called Michael and told him I wanted my own space as well. A place where I could close the door. That meant we were now looking for a three bedroom home: One room to sleep in, and one room each to call our own.

After much researching, Michael presented me with two options. One was just a few minutes walk from the main drag in town, had a porch swing, built-in bookshelves on either side of the fireplace,  and oodles of charm. But it also had one big problem: one of the offices had no real windows–only a skylight. In other words, were there to be a fire, it would be a deathtrap. I know not everyone considers these things, but I’m the daughter of a fire commissioner. A man who, upon visiting the Asheville bar that sits out on a fire escape 8 floors above the city asked me, “How far down does this go?” “Three levels I think.” “It better NOT go only three levels,” he said, “It’s a fire escape for the building.” He left me standing there as he went to investigate. A few minutes later he came back out on the top level. “So you made it all the way down,” I said. “Yeah, I had to jump down from the last part, but there’s a ladder there. It’s good. People could get out of this place.”

This is also the same man who attended a performance of Blue Man Group with me and my mother in Boston. At the end of the show devices that looked like paper towel holders above our heads automatically spewed lines and lines of paper out over the audience. “This stuff better not be flammable,” said my father. He tore a piece off and when we got back to my apartment he put a flame to it. We were all relieved to see it was not flammable. Mom and I breathed a great sigh of relief. My father on the phone yelling at the Boston Fire Department was not something either of us wanted to witness.

So no, there was no way my office would be in a room from which there was only one true exit. I, with much love, told Michael he could take that room . . . “So basically, we have a room in this house that neither one of us would use,” he said. Yep. Onto the next house.

The next one didn’t have the same charm–no porch swing, no built-in bookshelves, no fireplace. It was also a little further from the main street. (Eleven minutes, to be exact. Because Michael had timed it for me.) But what it did have was a full basement, a two car garage, and–most importantly–three bedrooms all of which had at least two exits.

Mom and Dad are coming down to visit the week after I move in. Mom has good nesting instincts and has made every house I’ve lived in a “home.” I have no doubt my father will, not too long after he walks in, assess the house from every angle. He was a plumber. And a general contractor. He has bought and sold all sorts of houses. I don’t know what he’ll think of the furnace or the hot water heater, but I’m 100% sure he’ll find the place meets the basic minimums for fire safety.