In the company of friends
View from my bedroom window this morning . . . . swan . . . .
Maybe one reason it doesn’t bother me so much to live in the city now is that I carry all the years I lived on the land around inside of me, running through my consciousness like a river, always close to my heart . . . the pristine beauty, the crisp first snowfall steps, the smooth river rock glistening, the gulf coast breeze in my hair. All the years of living close to mother in her many guises has given me something I guess I can never be separated from.
I haven’t forgotten the difference or gotten used to being in the city but I think for now I have accepted that my personal desire to live in pristine places is secondary to my concern about what is happening to all of us and I try to think what I can do, because I really am privileged compared to a lot of people, having a safe place to live, enough food and a computer even though I live way below the “poverty level” - for this country. So I advocate and I write because I am a writer. Maybe sharing my experiences and what I’ve learned will be of some help.
I think it is very very important for as many people as possible to live on the land in communities and become self-sufficient, growing food, securing their own water and producing their own power sources. The day is coming very soon when we will no longer have the option of driving around in personal gasoline-powered vehicles. Long distance hauling of goods, including food, will become prohibitively expensive. Power grids may fail or become outrageously polluting.
After almost 40 years of traveling, visiting communities and living in community, I am convinced that the most important factor in the success of a community is the combination of human energy - the personalities that make up the community, their common ground and the quality of their relationship to each other. The right combination can create a dynamic that can accomplish miraculous things. So I would say - if you are creating a community, put together the members as carefully as you would put together a band, or the colors in a painting, or the characters in a novel. When you have the right mix, you will know and your community will sing!
The next thing is - be prepared to work hard. Community building is not for the faint hearted. It requires fanaticism and deep love. It demands passion. Anything less and you will fall by the wayside. It also requires the discrimination to be able to say no when it is necessary, to know that some days are going to be hard and some days are going to be sad and be able to handle that, to be pragmatic and non-judgemental, to always come back to what is in the best interest of the community as a whole and to always look forward to what actions will secure the future of the community.
It takes years to get the soil right for an organic garden, years for those spindly fruit trees to bear fruit, years to get the hang of the seasons in your particular spot, when to plant, what pests to watch out for (see beyondpesticides.org ) and when to harvest before the first frost. Take time to lay the ground work well, make a place for the old folks and the children, get to know your neighbors. This is sacred work.
April 15th, 2008 at 2:03 pm
Beautiful post! I feel the same, both about having memories to fill me up now that I am less nomadic, and about the great need to take our time building community with the right people and watching our garden grow. Yes, very sacred work. The most important work of all.