Field notes for dream addicts

Aching wants, buttery plans, and slow-cooked epiphanies

I’m sitting at my usual spot in Arket Cafe at Copenhagen airport. I’m tempted to buy a pink negligee-style dress and an oversized white shirt, but opt for a matcha latte instead. Ferociously typing on my iPad, propped up by electric blue and ecru pillows, I hear someone call my name.

I look up, perplexed. Who would I bump into here? I see Bobby, an architect I met when I sat at this very spot five weeks ago on my way to the States. We talked about the farmhouse he was renovating in Sweden, the flights we had in front of us, him to Oslo, me to LA, and how Arket Cafe was the best spot to kill time.

I never expected to see him again.

Yet, just a few weeks later, here he is, standing in front of me holding a Hojicha latte and grinning. What are the odds?

This time, we swap Insta accounts, surprised that we’re both headed to Paris, but not on the same flight. He’s surprisingly calm given that he has to board in ten minutes.

Bobby asks if I’m going to 3 Days of Design in Copenhagen in June. I hadn’t planned on it, because I forgot the event existed. I had been too preoccupied with finding experiences in other places.

Hearing Bobby talk about his bubbly plans in Paris, from visiting the Sant Roch spa to slurping oysters for his birthday, I’m excited to get there already.

When I do, it’s not quite as I remember it.

I’m out of breath after walking up five floors.

My cute Air Jordan t-shirt, damp with sweat, is flaked with croissant, looking like buttery dandruff.

Hot sewage wafts through the window into my friend’s gorgeous Parisian apartment in the 2e arrondissement (near Les Halles if you’re familiar).

Summer is on the verge, spring is coming in strong, and her apartment, with its exposed wooden beams, skylights, and long balcony overlooking the rooftops of Paris, is hot af.

I used to salivate at the thought of living here.

When I’d return to Copenhagen, I’d watch French series and doomscroll the Parisian real estate app, dreaming of another life — walking along La Seine, writing poetry in small wine bars, getting lost in Jardin des Tuileries, giving a talk at Shakespeare and Co.

But this time, something feels different. I notice the tourists, the flaking paint, the cigarette butts and caked dirt, and the dark rings growing under my arms like mold.

The apartment didn’t change. It still has three bedrooms. A view you’d see in a movie. A courtyard location that muffles the sound of tables being cleared below.

Paris didn’t either.

Something in me did.

At first, I thought maybe Paris isn’t the dream location after all.

But it’s more than that.

I used to want from a place of not having.

I don’t have that, look what she has.

This was embedded like a micro splinter.

After Paris, my body pushed it out naturally.

That’s how I knew it was there.

This feeling of wanting from a place of not having is old.

As a kid who moved every couple of years, I’d imagine what it would be like to live in one place, specifically in thirteen-year-old Natasha’s three-story Art Moderne home with its cereal drawers, winding staircases, and carpets you sink into.

There’s nothing wrong with wanting more. I’d actually say it’s hella right. One life, so why not take a fistful of layer cake?

It becomes a problem when we overlook the stack of glistening Danish cardamom buns (or your local equivalent goodie) in front of us.

I want more, to grow more, to see what else I can experience, what else is here.

But wanting from a place of having is so different.

I’m actually obsessed with my life.

I built it, and it feels really fucking good.

I want what feels like mine — home-grown.

Bobby reminded me of what’s in front of me.

When this recovering nomad gets a second home, it won’t be because the life I’ve created isn’t enough. It will be from a place of having and wanting to experience more — a bigger, braver life.

This epiphany wasn’t sudden. It was slow-cooked. Built, day by day, in small choices and big ones — every time I asked myself what I wanted to create.

It started when I quit my agency job and launched Kollektiv Studio. Not just building a business. Designing a life. When we keep building toward what we want, one day, something dislodges within.

That’s how I arrived at my friend’s dreamy apartment in Paris, and instead of seeing myself drinking a cup of coffee on her balcony, I looked forward to coming home.

Keep creating,