A nineteen-year-old in Brockley plans a dream life in central London, studies commuter towns and wonders how Harry and Meghan afford privacy
Wednesday, 21 October 2026. Brockley. In bed by nine with a laptop and a dream, 9.15pm.
I Spent The Evening Shopping For A Life I Cannot Afford
Every few weeks I do the thing all young Londoners do, which is open three property websites, filter by Zone 1, sort by price, and cry quietly into a Pot Noodle. Tonight I went further and read the Londonish guide to living and spending time in Zone 1, which is basically a list of the places I walk through on the way to somewhere cheaper.
I love Zone 1 the way you love a celebrity. From a distance. With full knowledge that if you ever met it in person, it would ask what you do for a living and then look over your shoulder for someone more important. Zone 1 is the friend who always picks the restaurant. Zone 4 is the friend who has a sofa you can sleep on. I know which one I would call at two in the morning.
The Commuter Belt Fantasy
Then I did the other thing young Londoners do, which is pretend I might move somewhere outside London and commute in like a sensible adult. The Londonish list of twelve towns outside the M25 less than thirty minutes from London is genuinely useful and very dangerous at nine at night, because I started picturing myself in a cardigan with a garden and a cat and a hobby, like pottery, or disappointment.
Priya came in, looked at my screen and said, you would last a week. She is right. I would last a week. On day eight I would be standing on a platform in the dark at six in the morning, holding a coffee from a machine that judges me, and missing the 47 bus so much it would feel like a bereavement.
How Do Private Citizens Afford It
All of this made me think about the report on how Harry and Meghan insist they are private citizens while arriving at engagements behind barriers, with photographers, security and a coat so analysed it got more coverage than the Budget. The piece points out that most people stay private by avoiding photographers, not by inviting them to a scheduled event.
I have been a private citizen my entire life without any effort at all. Nobody has ever logged my belt. Nobody has ever asked where my coat came from. It came from a vintage shop in Peckham and it smells faintly of somebody else’s perfume, possibly a woman called Brenda who loved Charlie Red. If ITV ever wants a statement, I am available, but they will have to come to Brockley, and the barrier will be the bins.
The Privacy Starter Pack
My theory, after reading the piece, is that privacy in modern Britain is a luxury product, like Zone 1 or a dishwasher that actually dries things. You can only afford to complain about losing it if you have enough of a public life to lose. The rest of us are private by default. We are so private that the council does not always know we live here. I once waited eleven weeks for a bin to be replaced because the system did not believe my flat existed. That is real privacy. Meghan could never.
The Waterloo Question
Before bed I read the guide to commuting into London Waterloo, because my mum keeps suggesting I move back to Surbiton to save money. Mum thinks it is a simple trade: cheaper rent, short train, more savings. What Mum forgets is that I would be living with Mum. That has a cost, and it is not measured in pounds. It is measured in questions about whether I have eaten, whether I have a coat, and whether that boy from the internet has a proper job.
He does not have a proper job. He works on a help desk and wrote my Wi-Fi password on his hand. Mum would love him. That is the problem.
What I Decided Tonight
Before I closed the laptop I added up what a Zone 1 life would cost me per week, using the spreadsheet Priya made in 2024 called FUTURE US, which has never once been opened sober. Rent, travel, one oat flat white a day, and a single dinner out on a Friday. The total was roughly my monthly wage, every week. The spreadsheet also has a tab called EMERGENCY HOLIDAY FUND with a balance of eleven pounds forty. We are, I think, emotionally ready for Zone 1. Financially we are ready for a postcode in Zone 1 that we can visit on a Saturday and point at.
I am staying in Brockley. I will visit Zone 1 like a museum, admire it, buy nothing and leave by the gift shop, which is Pret. I will keep the commuter belt list bookmarked for the day I own a cardigan for non-ironic reasons. And I will continue my career as a private citizen, which so far has involved no photographers, no barriers and one very loyal hot water bottle.
Priya says one day we will both live in Zone 2 and feel incredibly smug about it. I asked her what Zone 2 would cost. She said everything. I said that sounds like a good deal. We have agreed to start saving next month, after payday, after the birthday drinks, after the thing on Saturday. The money, as the French would say, is in transit.