Hi Folks,
I've been reading posts on this forum for a while, actually it's been one of the things that keeps me truckin. You see, I recently got taken down several notches. It's a long story but my lifelong dream of living in, which turned into creating, an updated, smart, organized, sustainable and productive hippie commune (can those things all go together?!? Yes, they can!) had started to come true but then was seemingly sabotaged. I've been feeling on and off like giving up, however, every time I almost do, some miracle of kindness happens and so I keep moving forward. I am a truly blessed woman with a seriously funny knack for making lemonade.
For many years, pretty much my whole life, (really, my mom said that when I was 4, I asked her why people can't all have the same amount of money) I've been thinking about the hypocrisy of our so called society, trying to find ways out of the rat race, studying other people's ideas and thinking about a way to live that not only works, but inspires others to. I am fairly new to the wisdom of Paul, (I love that he calls himself a doofus) but I've always thought that many of the flags people take up in the name of trying to make the world a better place are at best a distraction and at worst an instigation and excuse to hate the "others". So I agree that a really good way is to "learn how to do stuff and do it, rather than be mad at bad guys".
A hard experience I had recently taught me the greatest lesson of my life and because of it, I have something really useful and hopeful to share and an opportunity/gift to give. I noticed that it has become more and more normal to play a game of one up in life. People are behaving badly and it's even admired! I looked deeply into the fear that is pervasive in our culture and saw that we are living in a traumatized world. If we go all the way back to when the advent of agriculture caused a totalitarian shift which in turn created a hierarchy, land ownership, unsustainable abundance, population explosion, profit and war, which in turn demoted women from being the very important givers of life to basically dime a dozen milk cows and from there fast forward to the 1970's when women in the so called modern world were more and more feeding their children formula from bottles and upholding the importance of having a "good baby" who could sleep through the night, so they could go to work, well, one can connect the dots to see the whole traumatic picture. Or at least a big piece of the puzzle.
That is, three generations of traumatized babies, mainly in America, many of whom have damaged ability to empathize and who compensate in destructive ways.
People, to do the permaculture, babies must be held and breastfed. Children must be treated with a lot of one on one presence, kindness and dignity. They must be free to learn and grow at their own pace within secure families that are supported by a loving and freedom loving community. One of my heroes, John Holt said, "School is bad for children" and I agree. To do the permaculture, I assert homeschooling and/or unschooling, non violent communication and attachment parenting are just as important as renewable energy, growing your own food, natural building and etc.
So here I am. I am looking specifically for families with children and/or couples intending to have children and who want to raise them in a permaculture way. To me, this is pretty much the whole reason for intentional community. It's all about the children and creating a place for future generations. Although I am a mom, my son is 22 and on his own adventure. I bought a beautiful 53 acre mountainside with abundant woods, pasture, 70 apple trees, 3 springs, a swimming hole, an off grid log cabin with gravity fed spring water, no zoning and many like minded neighbors in the Northeast Kingdom of Vermont, with the intention of building a community/learning and retreat center based on permaculture and practical spirituality. I specifically looked for a place that has global warming resilience and plenty of water. I would like to present an opportunity for families who have permaculture skills to come build to own your own little piece of the small eco village. I don't have enough funds to support anyone, but if you have a way to support yourselves and a way to house yourselves, I would love to hear about you and your family and discuss possibilities.
I will be at the Jamboree. Please come meet me at the Jamboree. For what I'm up to, it's really good to meet people in person and although I'm always willing to have visitors, I find that if I go places where people are doing the permaculture, I can put my money where my Otessa mouth is.
Eve
