M Ljin

Jay Angler wrote:I've been told by reliable people, that "outsiders" can have a rough time breaking into the "Village" community.

I would add that not only that but community is typically invisible to those outside of it. Once someone breaks in, it starts to become clear that it exists, but before this, you are naturally going to be clueless, except for some light shining around the edges. That is because the community consists of relationships, not institutions: institutions are highly visible in their nature, but they are not community.

It makes me wonder about intentional communities and eco villages for this reason—if you can see it from the outside how is it actually community? What you can see and talk about is just the dress, the raiment of community. If people these days are not being exposed to actual community and try to make one by getting together and living together, will they be able to do it? There is a saying about how most intentional communities fail. Maybe that is because the people making them, do so because they were deprived of real community and try to recreate what they can see from the outside without the opportunity to understand what’s inside.

I believe that community works because/when everyone has their own space that’s enough for them. How this gets figured out is trial and error. Figuring out what too close or too far is…I have some relationships that are too close and are causing me major trouble. But taking up spears and driving away the people with whom I am frustrated is not going to result in healthy community. Calling each other bad people, getting on each others’ nerves, stepping on heels and toes… that is a fast route to community death! If you can get a little farther away you might notice you can still love people at a distance. It may be that you can’t, but these things happen and we try to make the best of it. We also need to recognize when we need others despite their flaws and give thanks for what they give us.

Writing about this makes me so happy…even just writing about it. Community is such a treasure, there is nothing to compare. I am grateful for being present in it.

The issue of why it’s hard to get into community is that there’s no “community” Thing to get into. It is like going into “The Mountains”. You go hike up to a little hill and ask, am I in the mountains yet? No, you’re on a hill, but there are some big mountains over there you couldn’t see before. Then you hike up the big mountain. Am I in the Mountains? No, you’ve just climbed one big mountain. You’re on A mountain but not The Mountains. The same is true with any of the numerous mountains and valleys. You can sure tell when you’re not in the mountains or any mountain, though.  There is no destination or center, you are where you are and community is built around that. Community is the most natural thing.

I might have more to say… getting tired though

George Ingles wrote:Making a base layer of rose petals stitched together somehow would indeed be saving wear and tear on the over-garments and also be soothing and supportive to the skin from the contact with the rose petals...
I think that is very clever if you have the rose petals and skill and time to make such garment-saving under-garments...
I'm putting that on my list of luxuries to aim for.

Oh! I meant wild rose bushes that claw at you and rip at your clothes.

One thought is that loose clothes might wear less quickly where the concern is rubbing against itself/the body.

On the other hand, if the issue is roses, perhaps less so?

In my climate true mustards (black mustard specifically) is a summer green, but at the moment dame’s rocket and garlic mustard, members of the family,  are everywhere and very abundant so I have mostly been using them for greens.

That is interesting about not covering the pot… I wasn’t aware but will keep it in mind.

Tristan—

Thank you so much for the explanation! I wasn’t aware of the different techniques of measuring unemployment.

As much as I agree with Paul’s answer to the issue, I still think the issue is likely to he different.

Paul suggests unemployment—I suggest that there will be a lot more jobs and they will be harder, more grueling, and less pleasant than today’s worky jobs. There will be a lot of jobs created in pollution management, power plants (of all kinds and fuels), in mental health management and treating AI-induced psychosis (because people won’t be forced to use their brains at all) and in general feeding the AI machine and cleaning up after it. The solution is still the same: live sanely.

There is a historical precedent, the Industrial Revolution. It took away the work of spinners, weavers, craftspeople of all sorts and started rolling out mass produced cloth, leading to lots of people losing their jobs. Then, the machine, even hungrier, had to pull a great chunk of the population out from the countryside and into the city for factory jobs. People weren’t satisfied with what the automated process could make, they wanted more! And so the machine got fed and now we’ve fast fashion and disposable clothes, a lot more worky work around and not much unemployment last I heard.

Non-permie family veto. Also worry about pipes freezing without a hot-air system.

No wonder I feel so nasty in the house, we’ve had toxic levels of carbon monoxide… sadly no chance of changing this, but I can change some things which is good.

bump…

I would also plant oaks or chestnuts for nuts, because I feel like they’re one of the healthier staple foods for starch, all considered. Red oak (Quercus rubra) is the kind growing here and they double as a source of fat.

Or maybe you have some excellent native nuts?

While looking up Tasmanian trees I found a fascinating species, not really a nut tree though. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Eucalyptus_regnans?wprov=sfti1#

Not going to suggest crops so much as strategy…

As far as I understand no one has been able to have no inputs without fallowing, or food foresting.

The figure I have heard (maybe Will Bonsall said it?) is that cultivating more than one fourth (give or take) of the land at a time necessitates inputs—the rest being perennial something that goes into a composting (or animals). As a goat farmer the latter option seems wise! It’s also possible and possibly beneficial to rotate the cultivated area and leave the rest fallow.

So the goat manure and bedding go to making compost for your beds, which take up only 1/4 or less of the entire land (about a quarter acre per person— 9/4=2.5 acres). Turnips, say, could be good crops, and other roots—greens and vegetables could be gathered from the forests and fallows.

I also would include the forests and non-arable land into the food calorie equation because they can be excellent sources of all sorts of food—mushrooms, greens, some kinds of shade tolerant berries, etc. Especially if there are nut trees. And since they cannot be cultivated they need little input.

I would always emphasise foraging because it is so reliable and doesn’t require us to take up space in our own land.