I purchased a one story, two bedroom house on a pie shaped 3/4 acre lot in Stockton New Jersey. The property was pure Tobacco Road, as sad a place as one could imagine. At the County Health Department I found a file thick with violations and hundreds of polaroids documenting lives long ago fallen down their own dark rabbit hole. The overhanging trees sagged, the air seemed thin, grey and brittle, but the land itself, while in retreat, was lovely, surrounded by preserved woods, fields and a lovely creek. After clearing away the unhappy rotted house I set out to build (essentially by one carpenter, me) a simple modernist cabin for c. $125 a square foot using Cypress, Douglas Fir and Common White Pine available at the local yard.