aloha (Northern California)

new here, though i have been lurking for some time =)
google keeps directing me here, so i've spent a lot of time reading posts here and gotten a lot of good tips and info, some inspiration from the posts of the members.
finally decided to join in and sign up, share some info.

not at all new to these ideas though, i have been learning about and working with alot of the subjects discussed here for quite some time.
of course, still learning, still researching.
i currently am living in a small rustic off the grid cabin, building on it and making improvements as i go, growing a lot of food in the small yarden =)
...gatherings seeds and plants, making my art, inching along. i like to wildcraft and forage, build things out of whatever i can find, salvage, and earthen materials.

i've lived in different IC s, though...i should say atm i am bit frustrated with community...though, of course it is THE ANSWER. just had some really unstable and disheartening experiences trying to live communal with people, and the pretentiousness and off balance dynamics alot of the (so called) "community" projects...well i am starting to think i dont actually want to live in a "community" but i do want to live in a community. !

i've taken to saying why cant we just be "the people" at "the place" without a lot of extra enforced ideas, and trying to be something...and the exclusion of things....the private property paradigms die hard. yes this is what i think..... i would like to be a part of "the people" at "the place"...more of the informal community of the world, rather than in some gated off project with the exclusivity and off balance control/power issues that are so damaging.
...but i am still committed to the ideas...just not sure that "intentional community" is where its at for me anymore, which is weird because its what i have been into and exploring for a long time..... more drawn to the idea of neighborhood, the community at large, not choosing ones neighbors and having them conform or direct each other....personal sovereignty, and autonomy....these days. actually i have become quite a hermit, been spending alot of time on my own and doing my own thing.

though i think if i could find a community of people...who were more on the wavelegnth it would suit me better...who were self starters, into doing their own thing and minding their own business....more of a come as you are kind of project...thats more loosely held together, and more voluntary than obligatory...well thats the dream for me. or it was....to find some place that has the right mix of communal/autonomous, for me this would be heavily slanted towards the autonomous, self sovereignty, independance. i have no interest or concern...for how other people want to live and what i think they should be doing...i mean i do care somewhat, but then again not really. what other people do, if they want to waste their time and lives, not really my problem or concern....but not to keep track of people, the ongoing weirdness of everyone trying to figure out whats even and enough contributions, having long drawn out meetings discussing things that arent really my business or concern....ooo so many weird things that get amplified in the microcosm of intentional community projects.

whew...that was a lot more than i thought i would write, but there ya go...thats a lot about me and where i am coming from

Welcome to permies Leila
Cool, that's the first time I've written 'Leila' in reference to someone else!

=)
yes i noticed there was already a LEILA here, and it is kinda an unusual name, especially alt spelling
....i've read some of your posts in my lurking and noticed that..

my full name is leilani, so leila is my nickname. its a rare thing for me to meet another leilani, or even another leila.
i have only met one so far....a long time ago.

thanks for the welcome =)

We've got loads of 'Leilanis' in NZ. I think it's a pretty common Polynesian name, and while it's far from a tropical paradise round here at the moment, there's lots of people here from other Pacific islands shivering away

Hello other unique-named ladies!! I too finally found a second LaLena on the internet, what a wonderful resource the net can be when used to unite people with something in common

hey thanks for the welcome !

funny...i have been called lalena too...well i have been called everything from lily, to lilian...and all sorts of mangled versions of something close to my name...its not that difficult to pronounce, but some people when they read of try to remember my name come up with something close....

and...suprisingly or not...i have never been to hawaii and am not polynesian. kinda random maybe...that my mom decided to name me a hawaiian name...she says that i chose the name myself. when looking through a book of baby names...and saying them aloud....she came to leilani, thought she liked it...suggested it to my grandma...when she said it outloud, she went into labor !

so my mom says...i chose my name =)

At least you chose well, my parents did the same thing and gave me a spanish name and we are not mexican. At age 15 I found out it meant firewood, and the song they heard it in was about a prostitute, way to go mom and dad! I like your naming story much better than mine

yep i know that one, its a good one actually. always liked donovan
kinda sad one though....ah theres beauty and sadness there too.

ah i'm in goof off mode so here:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nsqPxEzInoQ&feature=related

of course, (like me and leila too, with the clapton song!)
youve probably heard this one a million times, and had at least a hundred people sing a small piece of it to you randomly...

ahhh here, the other:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Q_L-0Ryhmic&feature=related

yeah i suppose if you have to have a soundtrack song, that everyone sings to you, its better if its a good one by clapton =) or donovan =)

Bane of my life, that Clapton song My name's pronounced 'Leela' and the song's 'Layla'. I decided long ago that I'd only correct those that I was likely to see again. Even so, plenty of those people still call me Lila and Layla
While we're on names, I was originally called Pipistrelle, which sounds nice, but is actually the name of the (least uncommon) European bat.
It was the 70s, my parents were hippies...

ah i see, i will adjust the phonetics in my head =)

mine is phonetically the same as layla, just spelled differently cause i abbrev..

actually i only started going by leila, because thats what every body called me anyway no matter how many times i told them my name, so it stuck. !

but around here i am mostly know as blue. well thats my forest name.
and anyone who has to ask my name again after i tell them once or twice, gets only told blue. then they remember....
but yeah i respond to anything from lily to lelana to leah or whatever else....

i like pipistrelle, its very cute =)
and pip or pipi, i like the name pipi.

I had never seen my name performed, I had the cassette tape as a kid though, thanks so much for that!! I also like Pipistrelle, hooray for hippie parents

I know it's been a while since you started this thread, Leila, but I like what you have to say about community. I've spent much of my adult life in communities of various kinds, two of which blew up in my face! Yet, like you, I still think community of some sort is a huge part of the answer to human sustainability! The challenge, as you seem to know so well, is to discover how to work well together while "staying out of each other's hair". I think that, at bottom, private property and money were created in order to facilitate just that....though now of course they've gotten out of control....they've become ends in themselves and not means to an end.
There's a certain skill set required to get along with other people on a daily basis that is eroding fast in modern culture. Give and take, keep the peace, etc. Large families have this by default. As well as a lot of traditional societies where extended family is the norm. Modern intentional communities select for people who have the stubbornness and determination to choose against mainstream values and pursue an alternative. Too many chiefs and not enough braves. You end up with a cook-pot full of strong egos....which is fine as long as they get along and stay busy. If otherwise...duck and cover!
Ultimately, it seems, people will do community, in whatever form, when they have to.... when the other options dry up.... when change, mobility, relocation, etc....the whole addiction to choice, goes away along with the fossil fuel that enabled it in the first place. Unless the scientists pull a rabbit out of the hat, like the thorium reactor, to enable the American dream to go on without awakening to a finite planet.....

@ alder-
yes agree with all that, totally.

more and more i am thinking *neighborhood* is the a kind of community that is more functional, more distance and not getting all immeshed with people. for me that is key, especially at this point- seems the less you try to work out a lot of things with people the easier it is to get along. so there should be a lot of giving each other elbow room and private sanctuary...not a lot of obligations and expectations.

but with more sharing than a general neighborhood, like of useful things, transportation, tools, perhaps community gardens, etc that people should be sharing....and less sharing in head trips, power games, the kick out game.....and all that stuff that tends to happen when people get too immeshed in what other people are doing. i find that most everyone i meet, for some weird reason, seems to spend far too much time being concerned with what other people are doing and then making some kind of deal about it....

i am a self starter, and kind of a loner really, so thats something i really need- private time and sanctuary. to me it seems kinda obvious that we mostly want the same thing so why do we not give this to each other as we want for ourselves....not a whole bunch of people running interference on each other- just some togetherness and sharing and some private sanctuary...

these days i am quite a hermit and hardly talk to anyone...this is actually a good way to get along with people, just dont talk to them! ha...ok....maybe not the best way to get along with people, but i tell you its actually very freeing, if a bit lonely at times...to just not get into weird too close associations with people and to be able to have and give a lot of personal space to each other.

one of my oldest dearest friends and i used to talk a lot about starting a community....being a "leave me alone community"!
ha yep....a community, but yet with a lot of autonomy for the people....and not trying to work out a whole lot with others...just doing our thing but together...and some help, but without obligations....especially hidden obligations..

i think thats another big problem in communities, people have expectations, and a lot of hidden obligations, or spoken ones.

i dont neccessarily want to obligate myself to a huge group of people, and especially i am not taking on, or trying to live up to, peoples hidden expectations and obligations. anything one is obligated to... should be clearly put forth and agreed, something a child could understand...just really simple. and otherwise, people should be free to be as they are....and practice "leave alone respect"

so more into the general community of the world, the neighborhood where i am, more* as is * kind of community...less into "intentional" community....

The problem with being self-sufficient loners, like you and I, is what happens when we can't do it all any more? Whether for a weekend getaway, or an illness, or old age, or whatever? My partner and I are creating our little bit of permie paradise, but it takes every waking hour! Even an overnight away for both of us at this stage is a major project. I would gladly take in wwoofers but my partner has had enough of the drama they bring!
Part of this, of course, is never really getting out of transition and startup mode. Permaculture really is a multigenerational project as well as a community project. Nut trees certainly, and many fruit trees also, have productive lifespans much longer than our human one. Real soil improvement, and any significant earthworks without fossil fuel input, also take multiple generations of effort. Yet how many Western permies are occupying the same land as their parents, or even themselves in their earlier years? There needs to be a way, and it's beginning to happen, for older homesteaders to pass on their work to interested young people, with no or minimal cash transfer, so as to ensure good stewardship of a site through time. Private land ownership with cash valuation is a fundamental problem I think....

yep, yep, and yep. i hear you totally.
no one can do it all alone! obviously. somehow people get put up to this expectation...not that its all out there and if they realized what impossible standards they are holding themselves to...to try to do too much and feel this sense they should be able to do it alone. its just not possible, the nature of the universe is sharing =)

and not to say the stone throwing team and the drama club dont have some responsibility and blame for the situations they create, but it seems as though theres so much outside pressure, and so much thats stacked against people to now create (co create) community. all the systemic problems we have, the way people are taught to inter relate to each other....the basic insecurity that comes from living in the midst of some much unstability and so much lacking, what should be ours has been stolen ...and all those distorted forms of private property, the memes of our society...all this makes it very difficult from the get go to make community that is peaceful and functional. add to that the overinflated fake "values" of land...the real estate insanity...and its not hard to see why its so much more difficult than it should be to create community and get along.

people are living with so much insecurity in general...from that lack of a good foundation its even harder...and we blame each other unfortunately for things that are much larger than any of us as individuals. even for the anti drama club and the live and let live crowd, the odds are stacked against people....living in these nearly impossible situations...

but not to be too down on it or make it seem more impossible. i still know it is THE ANSWER, there is a way.

is recognizing this helpful? i think so, along with not having expectations....if one is looking for a perfect place with no problems...well give up now i say, it doesnt exist. we have to live here, with things as they are and find a way, and i do think it is changing, and thankfully, very fast....