Road trip 2015

Community road-trip 2015: an intro

As of June 2015, I have completed travels with my wife, Heidi, as we explored southeastern Australia in search of alternative ways to do life separate from the mainstream. Throughout the journey, I wrote a regular series of entries which documented our experiences and can be read under the menu heading “Intentional community trip 2015“. Here are quick links to all the entries on this trip (in chronological order):

This first stage road-trip around Victoria, Australia had us seeking to discover what various intentional communities, groups, individuals and families are doing in terms of living more creatively, sustainably and compassionately. We are considering another journey later this year to build on this first trip.

Our aim is to further connect with like-minded people and find security in community, not finances; share resources and ownership so as to reduce our negative impact on the planet; participate in non-violent actions to bring about a more just world; use the arts to bring people together, communicate the challenges that humanity faces, and promote positive stories and alternative ways of living; work with the land and protect/respect this Earth.

We have a lot to learn and a long way to go, hence our desire to see what other people are doing and what wisdom we can gain from and share with them. So far it has been an amazing exploration.

~ Mike Crowhurst, June 2015

Urban Seed part 2: Working on the margins in suburbia

~ DESTINATION NINE: NORLANE ~

Urban Seed seeks to connect wherever there is need, and Geelong’s Norlane is what they have found

As our exploratory trip of experiencing intentional communities nears its end, I am thankful that things worked out the way they have in terms of travel planning. Our last couple of communities are both very short stopovers, and while this leaves us with little more than a superficial glance into the lives of those who have often sweat blood and tears to be a part of their unique lifestyle, it comes at the right time for us when our information/road-weary selves are willing to forego “immersive experience” for “highlight version”. We are the first to admit that we feel that we are missing an opportunity with these last two groups, but perhaps it was the failure in our planning of doing too much for too long. Regardless, even experiencing a couple of days at a place like Urban Seed’s Norlane community in Geelong gives us 1000 times more value than simply reading about it.

If you have been reading previous blog entries of mine, you’d know about our (also) short visit to Urban Seed city outfit in Melbourne’s CBD. There, the focus was on working within a difficult urban space to support homeless folks doing it tough. In Geelong, Norlane is that type of infamous suburb that all cities have, where much of the crime takes place and the rest of the city’s inhabitants likely take efforts to avoid. Being a Christ-centred faith community, Urban Seed’s natural place to exist in this place on the margin of society, living in amongst the Norlane families who have experienced generational poverty and have given up feeling included in “normal” society.

The young and exuberant Urban Seeders of Norlane

The Norlane crew is a young bunch who occupy an old Baptist church as well as the attached hall and house. Moreso than the Melbourne group, they make me feel rather old! With everyone floating around their 20-somethings, it still never fails to impress me how people at their age have taken on such “mature” tasks like volunteering without pay to care for others, raising families in very challenging environments (and seemingly succeeding), managing difficult situations with violent locals and crime issues, plus counselling and supporting a wide cross-section of people including those with mental and physical disabilities. Like my own life, I still see one’s 20s as a time to explore, mess around and not be too serious, getting my act together once I hit my 30s. And by 30s, I really mean 40s.

Anyway, I digress… the space that the Norlaners occupy is an encouraging community gathering place, very loosely holding onto its “church” look and feel in favour of something that allows anyone from the community – faith-based or not – to feel comfortable and welcome. Groups stage meetings here, there’s a weekly food exchange (the “People’s Pantry” where locals pay a nominal semi-annual fee to stock up on donated food) plus lots of sharing feasting opportunities where many people from the community come for a free feed and a chat. Like in the CBD location, all “staff” are live-in volunteers who are 1,2 or 3-year internships, with the four people (I almost called them “kids”…gosh, I am getting old) currently residing in the intern house managing the programs and reaching out to the community when they can. Many of the programs revolve around food, and wherever possible, the intern group – Steve, Cherie, Sarah and David – coordinate the meals, etc. while bringing community members in as much as possible to “own” the administering of the event, again eliminating the “hand-out” mentality. Beyond the interns there is Simon and Kaylene who would be the other “official” Urban Seed staff (for lack of a better word as they are encouraging the lines being blurred between them and there rest of the community) who are the “elders” of Norlane’s outfit (in their 30’s I suspect, but the term elders is not meant to be disrespectful as they come in with considerable knowledge and wisdom of how to do and not to do community based on their own lengthy experiments).

Many other households contribute a great deal to the community hub as they gain acceptance with existing residents, plus – most encouragingly – former Urban Seed interns who finished their residency but felt compelled to continue the work they were part of despite being a fairly challenged neighbourhood in terms of crime, poverty and violence. Interns Sarah and David grimly regaled us in the various unsavoury encounters the community have been victim to such as: two of the interns’ cars being stolen, the continual (even mid-day) risk of physical attack when walking to the train station, the marking of houses with dogs in the yards so that they might steal them, shops that could no longer service the area after being repeatedly robbed, and so on. On my second afternoon there, I was walking the dog (keeping him close!) and two plain-clothed police (I presume? They had guns) came busting out of a yard straight towards me before veering a few metres to my left to leap onto a young lad in baggy trousers who was promptly handcuffed and shoved into an unmarked car. There was lots of yelling and other people beating a hasty retreat from the house I was now in front of as Kito and I continued along, agog at the front-row-seat activity before us. Not something we had come across in the comparatively closed communities we had been visiting to date! Despite all this, we were also told of encouraging changes within the community since they’ve been there, and a sense that they are helping bridge the divide between different groups of people here.

There is something appealing about being a part of a close-knit community who are trying to do something good and important to truly improve the lives of people who have had a pretty shit time of it and need a glimmer of hope to get them through life. On top of it for them, their unified Christian faith further binds them close as they journey together. I would struggle being part of this potentially powerful experience as the downside for me is the “social worker” aspect of people care for which I am not interested or cut out for, plus their spirituality isn’t where I am personally at, something I imagine that would be fairly integral to both this particular community and their ability to fight through the challenges they face. In that regard, I am thankful, humbled and awed by people like the Norlane Urban Seeders, who embody the servant-hearted characteristics of Jesus, plus epic fortitude, patience, grace and good-humour. I will continue to do my part in different ways to hopefully have a positive impact on this world, and I am glad there’s folks like the Urban Seeders to play their vital role!

Find out more about Urban Seed at their website.

Respecting the earth: permaculture at Fryers Forest

~ DESTINATION EIGHT: FRYERSTOWN ~

Built on pioneer David Holmgren’s principles, Fryers Forest is an eco-haven in Central Victoria

At the outset of this trip, I thought that we might be seeing a community “blueprint” that was repeated in each place we visited, with perhaps different variations on the theme. However, as I mentioned in my previous blog entry, not only does the term “community” carry so many different possible meanings, but the look and feel of each one is so varied that the only thing they all have in common is an intent to live together in some sort of deliberate way. Beyond this, the personalities and temperaments, village characteristics, geographical features, group focus, lifestyle choices, governance, spirituality and long-term vision have come in every flavour, shape, size and colour.

If our trip was actually about seeking a place for us to call home (which it may or may not be – we don’t know yet!), it might be a bit like deciding on what take-away food to get for the evening: for example, if I were trying to choose between Indian, Pizza, Thai, Middle Eastern and fish n’ chips (all delicious types of foods I love), other than rudimentary differences (starches, certain vegetables, etc.) all are very unique and difficult to compare directly. It’s not a bad situation to be in – picking from a great collection of options – but it begs the question of whether you just need to settle with a community that offers many things you want and others you don’t, or, cherry-picking ideas and putting the hard-yards in to build our own community. The trouble with the latter is threefold (at least):

most of these communities were started by people in their 20’s, bubbling with passion, energy and physically in their prime (we’re in that 40’s zone)
we need a significant financial base to start with (we have no Savings)
there is a staggering amount of research and paperwork – legal and political – to set it up and manage it, even if you want a basic and organic type of community (I’m not unwilling to do research, etc. but the legal/financial/policy stuff is a deterrent)

Beyond this, of course, is finding people who wish to share in your vision and are keen to see it through. The more communities I see, the more I have personally honed a vision compiling the best elements of all of them into my own community ideas, but have been equally tempered by my increasingly reluctance to have to go through the many years required to get the community off the ground having heard what is involved from those who have done it.

Enter Fryer’s Forest, a pleasant village consisting of 11 freehold plots on a shared 300-acre gumtree-covered property, 20 minutes drive south-east of Castlemaine, Victoria. Having completed another WWOOFing stretch of physical labour here this week, it reminds me just how much work is involved in keeping up and evolving a community. Of course, that’s just the physical maintenance; there’s also the people management which can be much trickier. Our hosts here at Fryers, Tamsin and Toby, have possibly found one of the loopholes to my DIY community conundrum though: they moved to this community shortly after its inception and have been able to ride the benefits of being an original (if not “founding”) member, helping shape the evolution of the village and feel that they have been involved since the beginning yet without having to go through the several years of starting the process, acquiring the land, council negotiations, etc. While I am personally attracted to having a say in the layout and design of the community, perhaps this can still happen on some level if I were to get in early enough but not too early.

Toby, Tamsin and their two boys

My own creation desires aside, Fryers Forest is an interesting place and I’m starting to see the virtues of their way of doing community, even if I wasn’t feeling the love as much initially. The closest town is Fryerstown, a hamlet consisting of about 400 people (which likely includes the 35+ folks of Fryers Forest), but the land was formerly a part of the Victorian gold rush 160-odd years ago when around 15,000 people would have lived in the area. Surrounded by thick forest and a peace and quiet we don’t often experience in our urban world, it is difficult to imagine it with gold diggers at every turn. The town was built back in the early 1990’s on permaculture roots with pioneer David Holmgren contributing heavily to Fryers’ original design. As our host Tamsin showed us on a tour of the property, there are permaculture considerations at every turn: tree thinning, top soil catchments (swales), building placements for sun orientation, water capture and transfer, low waste yields, the encouraging of fauna diversity on the property and many more things. For those not familiar with permaculture’s principles, they are essentially: take care of the Earth; take care of the people; and set limits for population and consumption. From what we could see, Fryers’ members took these principles seriously.

Our time was largely spent labouring for our hosts with wood chopping, tidying up the remains of three huge felled 100-year old trees, cleaning gutters and helping around the property. We came at a time where they were exhaustedly managing energetic 4 year-old twins while still helping neighbours with their needs: helping shift wood from the felled trees to use as a neighbour’s new home-building material, a working bee digging rain gutters on the roads, “taking care” of a nasty rooster for a friend, looking after friends’ kids while they were busy, and so on. It became increasingly apparent that the “community” part of their intentional living arrangement was quite active and involved. Tamsin and Toby both admitted that if they were unable to continue living at Fryers, they wouldn’t know what to do as they loved living there so much.

Wood chopping, stacking and planter task complete

The “office”, a cozy little mudbrick loft hut we stayed in while at Tamsin and Toby’s place

On the surface, Fryers wasn’t all that different from Moora Moora in that people could buy and sell their own land (though MM was as a cooperative arrangement and FF was completely freehold strata style), they lived in a loose village layout with a limited-use central “hub”, they both began using permaculture principles and were both off-grid on an isolated property about 20 minutes drive from a regional town. Interestingly, whereas other places we have visited have either their spirituality and/or social conscience to unify the community members, both of these communities only share their environmental interests (and separation from mainstream society) as the glue that keeps them together. A key difference separating Fryers from Moora Moora though was that the overall community was smaller and the houses were clustered much closer together. I reckon this contributes a great deal to the active interaction between groups. It is of course unfair to directly compare any of the communities as the personalities, planning specifics and overall history have simply made things the way they are, but physical proximity still feels like something that I imagine helps connect people better.

The community hall

The first four days at Fryers Forest were all about the work around their hand-designed and built home, and even our hosts kept apologising for not taking us into the community-at-large proving that other people do actually live here. Opportunities arose when Toby’s weekly men’s night arrived and I spent a couple of hours with the boys at their community space (an old fibro school house that was transported from nearby Fryerstown) to have some drinks, chats, smokes (not I of course 😀 ) and backgammon. Granted, not everyone was from Fryers itself, but I was able to see the centralised facilities at work plus the bonding between the lads. Heidi had a similar “Happy Hour” experience the following night with the girls playing scrabble in Fryerstown, and we further got to know various people in the village through work we did and via roadside conversations. Further to the idea of member interaction, Tamsin recounted many other aspects of community life she had experienced over the years – particularly with difficult parenting times – like when she would call out on their walkie-talkie system (each house is on the same channel and all have a walkie) that she desperately needed someone to take the kids off her hands, and someone would always immediately arrive to help. Or how the group bus brings the village kids to schools, how people help one another with their home building projects, how on one year together they built a pedal-powered machine to crush tomatoes to make organic pasta sauce for the village, or how the group holds barbecue events where dancing and carrying-on ensues on the foreshore of their man-made lake/dam on warm summer evenings. The more they thought of it, the more great memories began to flow.

Despite being more of a middle-class suburb of folks wanting to live outside the anonymity of the city with no external bond seemingly joining them, Fryers Forest seems to be doing pretty well. They just had all of their eleven property sites purchased now and on the way to be occupied for the first time in years, so there is reason to feel optimistic about their future. When I first arrived, I wasn’t feeling the community vibe: the forest was dry and the land was hard; but pushing past the superficial aesthetics and getting to know Tamsin and Toby’s family and their neighbours, I started to warm to what they had achieved here. It certainly has a lot of intriguing elements to look if we were thinking of setting up a new community, and I suspect with a longer evaluation, Fryers Forest itself could be a place that could be spent enjoying for many years.

As usual, Heidi’s own perspective and thorough write-up about our visit can be read on her blog!

Fire safe-slash-wine cellar. Complete with oven door.

Inside the groovy fire shelter

Time to reflect and heal

~ DESTINATION SEVEN: LAUNCHING PLACE ~

Natural beauty and deep listening at Sunnyside Farm

This week since leaving Moora Moora has been an interesting one but not necessarily because it was part of the regularly scheduled program. With no intentional communities on tap while we have a WWOOFing stint, it has been a good time to reflect on things and where we are at on this journey.

I’ve just left Sunnyside Farm aka Natural Healing Place which is located in the beautiful hills south of the uniquely-named Launching Place, Victoria, about an hour east of Melbourne. As Heidi and I explore how different people do “Community,” we keep finding ways to redefine the word; Sunnyside is comprised of 32 year-old Nathan Thurlow and his 3 year-old son, with his extended family living further down the road on a large property. Nathan prefers to refer to WWOOFers as new “friends” and creates a welcoming atmosphere that encourages people to want to stay for awhile in his hand-made spa retreat-like home. The space is broken into pods connected by vine-laced outdoor paths, with accommodation that includes: a couple of bedrooms plus a loft bedroom/office (our room) as part of the main building; a caravan trailer; a luxury tent; and a tiny caravan-like shelter. The lounge-dining-kitchen area is considered communal, not unlike the crossroads that is often created by intentional communities to enourage chance meetings and conversations. Among the other unique elements around the house area are a newly minted sauna (which looks like a pizza oven that you sit inside),

The loo with a view

outdoor bath and shower (the only bathing facilities, actually), a “loo with a view” which is one of two composting toilets and this one is situated on a covered outdoor throne with a beguiling view of the foggy hillsides, tin chook shed with happy scratching chickens and a productive veggie garden. Heidi and I took advantage of the outdoor bathtub which was very refreshing (especially in the very cool wet weather here!) as well as soulfully enriching as we sat looking at the trees, steam rising from the hot water as the rain fell and listening to the kookaburras sing.

The luxury tent we would sleep in if it were summertime

Nathan and fellow WWOOFer Mel

Nathan is a dedicated host, keen to share his learned wisdom about inner health through yoga, meditation, healthy living and positive thinking. Ironically, both Heidi and I arrived a bit burnt out, harbouring colds and probably needing to be guests at a place like this rather than as WWOOFers. As it happened, two days in, Heidi left to stay with her sister in Melbourne to get some down time, and I have taken a day off here to recover from my illness. Rather than be perturbed by the lost labour we were to have provided, Nathan has graciously taken it in stride and continues to offer his expensive organic wellness supplements, fresh ginger or chai tea, delicious fresh foods, helpful natural remedy advice and positive reading material for me while on the mend and leaning on his generosity. He lives a thrifty existence, so it is not with extravagence that he offers these things but through true kindness. I would go as far as saying he is quite servant-hearted, and his years of living an alternative lifestyle plus his self-education on different types of spirituality certainly show in his hospitality and deep caring for others. As he would say, perhaps in our current health/mental state, we were meant to come to him at this time; everything has its place and meaning for needing to happen when it does.

Mel doing some yoga

He could well be right about that.

In light of a bad cough and illness, it was perhaps not too wise for us to head on a little trip into the city on Wednesday (just prior to Heidi’s departure), with the two of us plus Mel (a WWOOFer who has been at Nathan’s for a month) and Kito. Our mission was to do some errands but mainly to watch a documentary called Dadirri: Deep Listening by filmmaker Helen Iles that we’d heard about at Commonground. The timing was impeccable as it was only the third small screening of this indie production whose theme revolves around the relationships within intentional communities, plus it featured places on our intinerary for this road trip (Commonground and Moora Moora, and the forthcoming Fryers Forest).

Best.Organic.Shop.Ever. – Terra Madre

After visiting the Best.Organic.Shop.Ever. on High Street in Northcote and scarfing down another vegan meal at Vegie Bar in Fitzroy, we went up the road to a little bar called LongPlay which has a cute little 30-seat mini-cinema out back. The film was attended by a crowd of community-minded folks and there was a palpable buzz to being amongst others like ourselves. Helen is British but spent time traveling and filming around Australia for 2 years making this film, with two others in the intentional community “series” that were made in the UK. The film, while technically a bit sloppy (IMO), was an interesting examination on the relationship side to living communally and conflict-resolution, with lots of appearances by places and people we had literally just seen like Peter and Sandra (Moora Moora) and Kate (Commonground), which was all a bit trippy! I met with Helen afterwards to express an interest in working with her on future projects of similar content, but she was quite exhausted from the experience being that she shot, edited and directed it all herself. Shame we didn’t cross paths sooner!

Yummy outdoor spa bath for soaking under the stars

Yummy outdoor spa bath for soaking under the trees

Our loft room at Nathan’s quirky but cool spa-like pad

So, a few things to consider from this mixed-bag week, which was good. Moving forward, I think we’re currently at a bump in the road which is probably natural in a journey such as this: we have filled our brains with plenty of information and experiences; we have not been able to retire to a familiar home where we can periodically recharge and relax; we’ve been brought down a bit by illness and miserable weather; and we are generally feeling the grind of being constantly on the move. With a break in the weather this weekend (yay, sun!) and our final significant week-long stay at an intentional community (Fryer’s Forest, then we just have a couple of short stays afterwards), I’m hoping that we will get our second-wind to carry us through to June when we arrive back in Adelaide. It will be interesting to see where we sit with all this once we get back to a familiar place with familiar faces; my feelings about community have wavered with what we have learned, but it has likely been tempered with other circumstances related to travel and fatigue. Once we’ve had some time to properly reflect in a month from now, we’ll see what ideas and thoughts emerge!

Intentional community beginnings: Moora Moora

~ DESTINATION SIX: HEALESVILLE ~

Terrific folks at the top of the mountain

Sometimes this trip feels like a slow-moving and expansive journey, winding its way increasingly further from our previous life. When I think about how it’s been 2 1/2 months since we left our Adelaide house and starting living in borrowed accommodation, it seems like we’ve been on the move for quite some, and we still have over 3 roadtrip weeks to go until we settle in with another 2 1/2 months of house sitting. Other times, like now, this journey feels like a whirling dervish with the experience seemingly just flying by. With our recently completed stay at Moora Moora, this latter feeling certainly prevails as we only had a scant 4 night stay there and now a new WWOOFing assignment is hot on its heels – barely time to catch our breath!

Moora Moora is a “celebrity” intentional community amongst some of the others on our trip, having been featured in many articles, news and tv programs since it was developed back in the 1970’s following the Aquarius festival in NSW (which apparently jump-started a number of such communities). As one of the longest-standing cooperatives still in existence in Australia, it was appealing to see if this developed, larger-scale and presumably robust community was continuing to go strong and what was its secret for success.

Apparently our diligent pre-trip planning had paid off, as all of our communities at the moment are within a few kms of each other, so we dropped Kito off at another kennel (no dogs, cats or animals for slaughter allowed at Moora Moora) and drove 15min to the top Mt. Toolebewong to their property. The first impression before even arriving to the front gate is the enchanting gum tree and fern rainforest for the first couple of kms leading to their gate. Once onto their property, it’s obvious that this isn’t a densely-packed community, but rather a private rural retreat at the top of the mountain. Despite the wilderness feel, it’s still only an hour drive to Melbourne CBD, whose city centre is clearly visible from the village. Amongst the first things we see are a giant wind turbine-slash-sculpture (we later learn that it actually was an innovative wind machine that never really worked, but when the press arrived for its launch, two people were hidden inside the base turning the sail on cue for the cameras), plus a couple of dwellings, lots of hand-carved directional signs and a heap of open space. Once you learn that the property is set on over 600 acres and the residential living area is spread amongst 6 clusters of 5 houses each over 13 acres, then it is clear why we’re not rolling up and seeing much yet. Later, when we did a tour of the residential areas, we were able to see how spread out the village is with all the houses nestled in amongst the dense forest. In fact, 2/3s of the whole property is to be left as native forest and never to be developed.

With a nice stroke of luck our hosts turn out to be Sandra and Peter Cock, not only two of the original founders but the visionaries of the whole Moora Moora idea. Having traveled around Australia and beyond looking at 50 alternative communities for Peter’s PhD thesis (creating a book on the topic in the process), plans begun for Moora Moora. A core group of energetic young professionals planned what they hoped would be a communal-living settlement where individuals owned their owns house but the Cooperative owned and governed the land. Through his research, Peter felt that this structure would be best suited for a community that hoped to endure the test of time. Forty years on, Sandra and Peter have grown into parents and then grandparents, have watched members move or pass away, have withstood a variety of personal, legal, local government and environmental challenges, and experienced the majority of their adult life from within an intentional community. From what we can see, they have come through very well, with the usual number of regrets consistent with a project of this scale and complexity, but still smiles on their face. In terms of regrets, Peter feels that the shared community elements and the true spirit of what an intentional community is all about – the relationships – are what could be improved as many people are content to withdraw into their individual lives if let be. Overall though it is clear that they have been part of an impressive community-building project.

Our actual stay was part Intentional Community Education and part working holiday (WWOOF). Peter, a tall and slim 60-something chap with a cheeky glint in his eyes and quick wit, was not shy at getting us in the thick of the work, though he vigorously participated in it as well. Despite of persistent threat of rain (it was constantly wet, foggy and windy up there, plus 4 degrees colder on average than the town at the foot of the mountain), we spent as much of our 3+ days there outdoors. Whereas food preserving was the call to order at Commonground, here it was preparing firewood for the quickly advancing winter season. We sourced previously felled trees from a clearing in the woods, shifting a tonne of wood (quite literally) numerous times onto the back of the Moora Moora shared tractor’s trailer, and then power-split the pieces (using a diesel-powered splitter I named “The Beast” for its awe-inspiring wood-smashing abilities) and stacked it all. When the weather finally impeded our best intentions with wild wind and lashing rain, Heidi worked the apple peeler and nutcracker while I provided some video recording and computer training to our hosts. As with every day, Sandra would provide us with warm soups and tasty homebaked snacks through the day and a delicious dinner each night – mostly vegetarian or vegan to her credit!

In the end, what was different with Moora Moora than we might have expected was the more isolated experience from other members of the community. With the exception of a couple of chance encounters on the village roadsides and a movie night where we got to see some good group bonding, there wasn’t too much obvious regular interaction between members of the community. Of course, in 4 days (and cold, wet ones at that), we weren’t getting any kind of typical gauge to work with, but my guess is I’d still feel that we were getting a fairly accurate sense of the place. Peter himself mentioned that if he could do it again, he’d make all the house clusters closer to the central hub (where their share facilities were) to encourage more regular interaction between members. In terms of my own community village design ideas, the thing I would take away from Moora Moora is the cluster idea, even in a small community village setup. The main reason is conflict; Peter says that one of the reasons they have survived is that when a cluster has its own problems or goes bad, it doesn’t bring the whole place down.

Peter and Sandra’s cluster shares this solar array amongst the 4 houses

We became quite fond of Sandra and Peter during our stay, as well as with Mark – a long time resident and friend of Peter’s – who was living in Peter and Sandra’s house while we visited. Mark has tremendous knowledge, ideas and insight as well having been connected with local government and councils for years, plus a member who’s been involved in the journey of Moora Moora for a long time as well. Despite the short stay, we were once again treated with warm hospitality, engaged in plenty of quality conversations about everything, gleaned amazing wisdom and advice about communities, and made a great connection for future visits or more. We’ll aim for spring or summer next time perhaps though! 😀

Mt. Toolebewong from the valley. Still enshrouded in clouds

I found this guy sitting at the back door

Discovering a lot of common ground

~ DESTINATION FIVE: SEYMOUR ~

Serenity, companionship and social change

What an interesting trip this has been! We’re so very fortunate to have been welcomed into some beautiful communities, with memories that will stick with us for a long time. When we hit our first highlight spots early on, I though that maybe we’d be tailing off a bit from there. But then along comes Commonground, and the goal posts get moved again. With lots of laughs, freely offered information, engaging backgrounds, varying journeys, open minds, good work ethics, shared ethos, and different reasons for ending up in this community, our week here with these great people was delightful and, frankly, difficult to leave.

Going into this experience, we already knew about how Commonground had been around since the mid-80’s and were more than just an intentional community, so we felt confident that we’d see a well-established place that couldn’t have lasted this long without having a solid foundation. Interestingly, whereas everywhere else we’d visited so far had an obvious spirituality at its core, Commonground is instead centred around social change. However, there was a palpable “spirit” to this place which transcended a prescribed doctrine.

What makes them different is that the intentional community aspect – while integral to the whole – forms one part of a system of elements that help bring about social change in our world. Briefly, their three aims as an organisation are:

To provide a conference and retreat venue for the social change movement at the Commonground property
To provide collaborative workplace education and training to help people work effectively together for social change
To develop a vibrant Intentional Community of people living and working together at Commonground.

On their website, they talk about the early days of why the community was started: “We often talked late into the night about everything from economics and its relationship to global

Kate and Phil, two of the original founding members

poverty and injustices, the grossly unequal sharing of the worlds resources, the nuclear family, women’s issues, indigenous issues and the state of planet Earth!” Given their wide range of skills and backgrounds, they began to shape their focus: “At some level we did not want to just keep fighting against the structures and problems we saw. We felt it must be possible to create other ways for us humans to live more collaboratively on the planet.” Being that they wanted this community to be built on on ongoing movement and not just individual owner/share collective, they opted to be a non-for-profit to ensure that the community continued well past the original owners’ lifetimes there. Two of the original members we hung out with most while there were Phil and Kate; 30 years on and they both seem keen on keeping the original plan on track and intact.

The property at Commonground is set up with numerous buildings, the main one being “The Wedge” (pictured above) where we stayed and which also houses the conference centre and guest accommodation. There are currently about 6 people who live full/part-time at The Wedge with another 7 at other hand-built homes around the 95-acre property. On a given day, nearly everyone living on-site will pass through the Wedge to cook or share a meal, do some work, have a chat or rest. The cooking roster involves everyone and all dinners are shared so the dining room ended up being a great place to catch up on the day and keep the Commonground family close. We never felt uncomfortable being brought into this fold as everyone was quick to engage in conversation, answer our questions or help us out in some way. Heidi and I were given a room in the conference quarters (and later moved when a group rolled in); the whole Wedge building is filled with a myriad of mud-brick walled bedrooms and bathrooms, each with their own character and outlook to the uninterrupted bushland surrounding it. While not built entirely for off-grid living (no solar due to prohibitive cost when it was built, and the need for reliable power during conferences; one outdoor composting toilet but rainwater and dam water within), the innovative acquisition of building materials and recycled pieces that make up the building coupled with a reuse & repair philosophy and zero-waste gardening makes for a very sustainable contribution to the community.

Dinner is always a shared experience filled with great chats, catching up from the day and amazing (mostly vegan!) food

Carl with some fresh garden produce

Even though we had eyes on Commonground for the intentional living angle, we were visiting as working holidaymakers and were given extracurricular tasks on a daily basis to help out the local residents who might not get to them as often. Our tasks tended towards food-related and preserves as a few items were ready to be harvested. Picking, cutting, juicing and bottling was the core of our labour, but being that the kitchen is a cross-roads that everyone passes though, it was a good spot for interaction and conversation. To our delight, all this food prep meant we were able to take advantage of the extensive gardens kept up largely by Brian and Carl, with a green-grocer level of variety to choose from! There’s nothing nicer than creating an entire meal out of ingredients pulled from the ground as we did for our lunches many days. Brian had also been keeping bees for the past couple of years, so delicious fresh honey was also always available.

I was beginning to think that places like Commonground were an amazing secret with their balance of low-intensity work life, bountiful social interactions, beneficial child-rearing opportunity with co-parenting, constant fresh and healthy foods, low-enviro-impact lifestyle and serenity only an hour out from Melbourne. But I think the word is getting out indirectly through things like their near-weekly groups that use the facilities as a group-work facility, the representation they have in Melbourne, the connection with local town Seymour and the recently-minted boutique music festival which brings in a limited number of punters who are as interested in the workshops as in the music.

Not everyone is rushing to be part of this intentional community despite these inroads, but they seem to get a regular stream of devoted workers/members which continue to keep things afloat. Still, Kate and Phil told us about how they are currently tweaking some of the core membership attributes to ensure that the community lives on well past their own ability to live here which might entice more folks. Commonground takes a certain type of attitude to be part of: living with a close-knit group plus a willingness to hold lightly to money insofar that you are working to contribute to the health of the community but you can’t just walk away with a lump sum if you decide to leave. In my current state of mind, this seems ok to me: with a one-time membership cost of $100, a very modest $30 weekly contribution to the food and bill kitty and 10 hours of expected weekly work for the community in exchange for comfortable on-site accommodation, delicious freshly-grown food, the responsibility of cooking for the household only once a week and the rest of the time spent doing your own work or learning new skills with some of the many projects on the property….well, it seems to me like a great deal. To cap it off, the people you’re living and working with are exceptional, friendly and like-minded folks. To say that we aren’t tempted by what Commonground offers would be an understatement. But this lifestyle still doesn’t seem to be a likelihood for many in mainstream society and I think it all comes down to assets: we cannot acquire anything at Commonground and thus all your work there won’t help you buy anything “in the real world”. Again, I’m not bothered by this, as long as you are willing to concede to living the rest of your life in this or a similar community. Of course, there is time to bank up savings and then move on but I see this type of community as one that you don’t want to leave because it provides you with most of the things we really desire out of life…things you can’t buy.

There are heaps of things I could talk about from our week at Commonground like excess cantaloupe (we spent hours making cake, juice and sorbet), the creation and naming of cooch grass beer (Carl came up with “Cooch Hooch”), Kasia’s obsession with psycho-drama to help sell items around the property (none of us could really figure out what a psycho-drama was), Greg’s deftly-placed one-liners at meal times and talk about his recently purchased cigar-box guitar, Phil’s wry sense of humour and helpful direction, Ed’s direct-questioning and foul-mouthed hilarity, Izzy & Carl’s foozball fixation and much more. Overall, it was such a rich week of enjoyment, learning and experiencing community that we are forced to once again re-think what we want out of a community and what could be a good fit for us, even in a shorter term. As usual with this trip, things are getting very exciting!

As usual, Heidi’s take on Commonground is filled with some beautiful thoughts and a unique perspective from mine. Make sure you have a look.

Working on the margins of society

~ DESTINATION FOUR: MELBOURNE ~

Living amongst the poor with some rather nice folks

As with all of this trip so far, my expectations of the people or communities we are about to meet tends to be fairly different than the way it actually is. Never in a bad way though; I guess I am either coming into this with strangely low assumptions (possibly based on my recent negative feelings towards some of the human race) or the people we are meeting truly are exceeding the standards for even the most decent folks! Or perhaps we’ve struck it lucky…or maybe a combination of the three 🙂

The only personal and direct comparison I have to living on the margins with people on the street is the Waiters Union experience as I have mentioned in a previous post. In that experience, members of that community rubbed up against the mentally ill, homeless and other people cast aside by society and worked in that space by sharing meals, starting complimentary businesses and projects, doing creative work and finding ways to walk alongside them and meeting them where they are at. Not surprisingly, the crew at Urban Seed in Melbourne’s CBD are doing many of the same activities. Always surprisingly though is just how much generosity, grace, humbleness and genuine hospitality is apparent through all its members, especially (with no condescension intended) given they are such a young group.

Heidi originally heard about Urban Seed about 15 years ago while my prior knowledge of them was counted in days. Despite celebrating 20 years of service this year, many people that we have spoken to within the city and even ones providing similar services have not heard of them. This low-profile is likely a deliberate approach: it’s not about being flashy (and there’s no budget for that anyway) but simply doing life at the ground level (or even the basement 😉 ) with those in need, particularly the homeless, the damaged and the unwanted members of society. They have a residential internship community consisting mostly of a small volunteer corps who are dedicated to “practising the discipline of hospitality, by inviting others into the home they had built in the church.” Urban Seed says that “everyone needs a place to belong” but with a high staff turnover rate where pretty much no one exists from most of the past 20 years, it is easy to see that offering hospitality and a sense of belonging to those on the margins is not a task for the feint of heart.

Woodsy (blue shirt) offering lunch

One colourful character named Woodsy has been here for 15 years and would have been around during the “heroin years” as several people have called it, when ODing became a regular occurrence. We first came across Woodsy the moment we entered the Credo Cafe space (which is entered off of Baptist Lane at the back of Collins Street Baptist church) as he was running lunch prep for Tuesday’s weekly “free lunch”. This is how Heidi and I were introduced to the group of random plus live-in volunteers who keep Urban Seed’s numerous programs running day after day. Having been provided with a loose schedule of regular activities with which to attend and essentially shadow the live-ins here, first up for us was helping with Credo’s well-known lunch; it isn’t quite a soup kitchen but certainly provides much-needed meals to folks doing it hard on the streets of Melbourne’s CBD. It was a great introduction to Credo on a number of levels: we got to see the relaxed and friendly nature of the volunteers as they both did their usual chores but also how we were seamlessly brought into the fold; we immediately met the regular Credo diners and spent time hearing their stories; and we enjoyed a generous free meal (Indian curry, grainy bread, drinks and dessert) with leftovers being offered to any of the 30 guests who wanted to take away a container with them.

On our busy first day, we went from the Cafe to an informative meeting with Stephen Said, Urban Seed’s friendly Engagement Manager who answered a lot of our general questions. It reminded us further of how tight this relational work community is as both Heidi and Stephen had a lot of overlapping work and personal contacts despite never meeting each other before. An administrative meeting followed that which allowed us to glean some interesting info about the inner workings of the Credo team and the challenges they face with things like homeless folks getting territorial when overstaying their welcome in the Credo “backyard” (the lane behind the church) plus financial concerns, scheduling and other mechanics of living in community.

As with our other stops on this trip so far, there is a lot to absorb and it while we have been gobbling up all this valuable material that our hosts have graciously been providing, it makes for a tired little brain. Luckily there was some available space in one of the apartments of the church office/residence tower for us to crash as some residents were away that week. Our room on the 7th floor was decked out with a PS3 and weight-lifting equipment which initially belied my vision that it would be more monastic given the Christ-centred nature of our hosts. A bit 18th century thinking on my behalf perhaps though I was surprised to see some first-person-shooter games on hand! I guess everyone needs some way to release tensions in this challenging environment!

The rest of our spacious apartment housed Rachel and Scott who were oft absent due to study/work and illness, but our neighbors, Tim and Beth, on the 9th floor were quick to invite us up for dinner the first night. Throughout this trip I have been continually impressed by the hospitable nature of our hosts, and Credo’s group were no different. But it is not just hospitality at work here: it is genuine, open and non-judgemental conversation with good listeners. On top of that, Tim and Beth (plus Jono and Michael the following night) were 20 years my junior yet embodied a mature presence and impressive capability for patient, honest and welcoming companionship. It would be easy to be workmates or friends with people who are so used to thoughtfully engaging with any and everyone. I felt like I could learn a lot from folks like these.

Other highlights from our short visit were: a walk around the area streets with some year 9 students, a writing class with local folks of all backgrounds and a men’s shed morning. The first was a suggestion by Stephen; he thought we’d enjoy the awareness-raising educational walk that Evan – a non-resident Urban Seeder – does with year 9’s. Apparently they have a program organised with 3/4 of all Victorian schools to do these exposure tours where the kids are invited to examine their own biases and stereotypes to do with homelessness. Learning things like that only 5% of all of the 25,000 homeless in Victoria actually live on the street but those 5% are truly lacking any support system beyond what is offered by government and groups like Urban Seed. Evan was pretty savvy to the thinking of this age group, engaged them effectively and had them all listening carefully by the end of the tour.

Next up was the writing class where we met with a eclectic mix of folks who had been involved in a series of artistic classes with Brigitte, the partner of Evan. She had guided the group through painting and now was writing with photography next month. I was floored by the talent of the 3 older folks as they reeled off fine pieces of literature in our 5-minute timed assignments which reminded me that there are a wealth of stories to be told from people on the streets and in the community-at-large that often never get heard. On the final morning, there was a Men’s Shed sort of activity where a suburban house and adjoining church hall had organised to have Urban Seeders come in to use a garage full of tools and timber to do wood-building projects. Jono (8th floor) and I took the train out to Ascot Vale and met Woodsy who was the only other person to come this week. There was a mix-up with wood supply which resulted in Jono and I wandering the streets in search of a wood pallet, but luckily my pallet-sniffing senses were still keen from my Holden Hill days and I found us a nice one. We promptly put together a wood crate to be used as part of a table, and were wrapped by lunch.

In such a brief stay we managed to experience a microcosm of life in the CBD which, on one hand, seems really inconsequential, but due to the richness of the people involved was surprisingly engaging and educational. I can only imagine what living here for weeks or months would be like (scared to think that I would likely not be cut out for it), but it would have to be something that you would remember the rest of your life. I can’t say that it’s my type of community dream, but I greatly admire the commitment, patience, resilience and devotion of the crew here as they do something very special in the name of their faith and humanity.

Check out Heidi’s take on the visit to Urban Seed.

Strawbales and tipis, native spirituality and hospitality

~ DESTINATION THREE: DAYLESFORD ~

I love being pleasantly surprised…

My initial impression was that this was going to be a very different experience than our last stop at Cornerstone in Bendigo. When researching for the trip, Gentle Earth Walking sounded interesting primarily for the potential for strawbale building (something we were keen on trying) and staying in a tipi. Now that we have left, I am re-reading the entry in the WWOOFing guide about this spot, and while it describes everything that was there in a practical sense, we in no way could have been prepared for the things that actually made it such a rich visit. From the effortless hospitality of our hosts Sue and Don to the peaceful rhythms of nature on their 40 acre property, we felt welcomed as part of the family with nothing being too much trouble. From the authentic incarnation of indigenous Australian and American spirituality that they practiced to the abundance of interesting ideas and projects around the property, their sense of dedication and care for the Earth and its peoples was clear. And while we weren’t expecting it to have an obvious community element, the outreach to community through creative and intelligent means made us realise that Sue and Don were dedicated to living out their beliefs and lifestyle goals as thoroughly as possible.

A feature of the stay that we quickly discovered was that Sue and Don love to tell stories. We heard a broad array of tales from their lives – learning that they were very well traveled, have had colourful and complex family lives, have experienced some amazing and unusual spiritual events, and are willing to throw themselves into any situation with vigour – all told with humour, trust and openness as if we had known them for years. Granted, at times we felt overwhelmed by the sheer volume of stories and retreated to our tipi at the end of the night with explodingly full brains, but we continually found ourselves returning and increasingly engaged in their intriguing lives. Given how many dozens of WWOOFers they’ve had over the years, you have to wonder how they tell these stories with enduring freshness!

Often our conversations were around their dining table which is the centre of a very full and cluttered room that houses all of Sue’s office and computer, the lounge room and tv, the kitchen and pantry, dining table, and inventive clothes and pot racks made from ladders hanging from the high ceiling. In the midst of it all is a pot-bellied stove, continually roaring with flames as the weather was cold these nights (even down to -2ºC one night) while we were there. The room is jammed full as the strawbale house they live in isn’t complete and they have had to pile everything into this one room until another area is ready. Mashing everything and everyone in one place meant it was a cozy place to retreat to at the end of the day, and there would always be something going on like a spirited conversation, visiting family popping in, Don bottling some ginger beer, chooks trying to run inside the back door, Sue digging through boxes to find us books on strawbale building, endless cups or tea and coffee boiling on the ancient stove or Don doing his back exercises on the floor. Part of feeling at home there as well was that they weren’t at all precious about anything: there were no locks on doors, car keys always left in their old cars which we could use whenever we needed to, and nearly everything was a found object or had been reused, recycled or repaired.

The house is a very solid place filled with touches that indicate that this is a house made lovingly by hand. The bales offer amazing insulation and sound-proofing, looking great in an organic, hand-made kind of way. At about 200 square meters (2000 sq ft), it is a big place, and with the wonders of strawbale building (cheap materials and often free labour or simply less than a typical build), it only cost them about $30K. For those uninitiated with strawbale building, it offers so many advantages over brick or timber construction (cheaper to build, less labour, superior insulation, superior fireproofness, longevity), it’s a wonder why more houses aren’t built this way. Sue and Don have clearly been educating and enticing locals as well, as they are directly responsible for teaching or helping 50 buildings be built in the Daylesford area.

My dreams of building such a home were only increasing in intensity as we began seeing all the potential of the various strawbale projects around the property. And sure enough, they put us to work on a wall that had been half-sealed and needed rendering and repair. We spent the better part of a week working on the wall and it was fantastic getting our hands dirty learning about the craft. Both Heidi and I really appreciated doing the work and didn’t get tired of the labour; there’s something invigorating about working on a project like this, particularly if you are typically used to sitting in front of a computer all day like we are.

A unique part of this experience was staying in a Native American-styled tipi which was as genuine as the original ones found in North America. Ours was a 16 foot style (base diameter, about 5 meters) and about 30 foot high (10 meters) at the peak. The cool thing about a tipi is that, like the original ones, you have a fire pit within. Special wind-control flaps on the outside plus an inner sleeve help control air flow so smoke from the fire is drawn up and out the top of the tipi. We had mixed luck with keeping the tipi from becoming choked with smoke, but when we did get it to work it was a great way to warm it up. And warmth we needed as we happened to hit frigid temps a few nights! I was a bit over the tipi experience by the end mainly because of Kito who was never at ease there and had worked out ways to escape the tipi which was a problem if we were off working. So poor Kito was stuck lashed to a pole with his leash inside the tipi and I felt either bad for him or annoyed as he tried so hard to make life difficult for both of us!

At the end of all the work and life on the property there was Sue and Don, two very interesting, inspiring, slightly eccentric (but wonderfully so!), gracious, trusting, open and hospitable folks. We particularly found Don to be a rare wise soul, someone who projects a feeling of goodwill and joy whenever you speak with him. Nothing is too much trouble for Don and he will embrace the opportunity to discuss a situation or have a laugh. We undoubtably asked too many questions as Heidi and I are prone to doing, but neither of them appeared to be put out by it. I aspire to that level of patience – serenity now! With Don, his spiritual journey seems to have led him to a place where he has an easy relationship with whatever life throws at him, with a gentleness, grace and wisdom that is difficult to find these days. We had many laughs at the various stories of people thinking he was a bikie or a vagrant, which again reminded me – as with many times on this trip already – that judging someone solely on their looks will almost always get you into trouble. Finally, they are creative and open to try anything – as their lengthy history of jobs and experiences attest – and for the last 15 years, Don has invested his time into bending timber using 150 year-old equipment and positioning himself as the only timber bending business left in Australia. I spent a day filming and editing the following short video on Don and his work and I think you can get a sense of Don’s passion for the work and how it extends from his passion for the earth as he discusses working with the 4 elementals of life.

What a wondrous and rich exploration this trip is turning out to be!

Also make sure you see another perspective of this experience on Heidi’s blog!

Cornerstone: Community 101

~ DESTINATION TWO: BENDIGO ~

How many times can I think: “wow”

So we’ve certainly started on the right foot with our community education! Cornerstone in Bendigo is pretty great and an awesome model of caring and committed intentional community. Now, you might say we lack context for comparison to other communities given that it is the first intentional community on this trip (possibly second ever next to Waiters Union in Brisbane), but I think with everything I’ve read about IC’s and our my own personal experience with community of different forms, I can honestly say that these guys are doing an amazing job on a number of levels.

One part that I can compare to is with our friends back in Adelaide. I recognise more clearly now what some of our friends are doing there to create a true atmosphere of servitude (in the “following-Jesus” sense), plus hospitality and relationships with disadvantaged and outcasts like refugees. What I have always found frustrating about doing community in Adelaide though (which has been further emphasised since visiting Cornerstone) is the direct proximity of homes to one another. In Adelaide, we just simply all live too far from each other and it makes a HUGE difference in my opinion. I can see the heart and intent in Adelaide but we need to find a way to live more in physical community as well as intent.

Andrew and Rose, Cornerstone’s co-founders, and our hosts

What has been a joy in Cornerstone is that everyone lives within walking distance from one another and the local converted church-cum-community centre and shared garden is just up the street and is proving itself to be a true hub for bringing everyone together. Schools are close by; shops, cafes and town centre all close too. The idea of popping into a neighbor’s home to not only share a cuppa but discuss a community project or other communal activity is what is great and wouldn’t have the organic and dynamic effect that it does if distances were stretched.

Besides this, Cornerstone was a joy to be a part of immediately upon arrival due largely to our hosts Rose and Andrew who practice warm hospitality with ease. We felt instantly welcomed; and while they explained that their house has been constantly used as a place to stay over the years by families, uni students, refugees and travelers like us, we never felt like they were put out by us being there. Quite the opposite in fact: we were given a generous amount of their time to tell us their story, share meals together, tour the community and introduce us to other members. Being that their lives are driven largely by their faith as followers of Jesus played a part in this I suppose, but Rose often indicated that the community consisted of people from all walks of life and levels of belief (or not) so there was absolutely no bias about how they treated others despite sometimes very different perspectives on life.

Rose, of Mexican descent, in her beautiful Mexican-inspired kitchen

The way I’d describe Cornerstone is true intentional community from the heart and soul: followers of Jesus who manage to strike a balance between discipling, community living, organic development of relationships, grace, authenticity and generosity. While my spiritual beliefs and journey are sometimes in a far different place to these folks, I never felt ostracised, belittled, scorned or unwelcome to share opinions. Andrew invited me to sit with a weekly men’s group and again I was freely encouraged to contribute and didn’t feel out of place when they discussed biblical passages or other things foreign to me. To me, there’s a true generosity of spirit in play that runs deep inside this community. You feel like they have no reason to hide feelings or fake acceptance just to be polite: it comes from the heart.

Going into this experience, my pre-visit expectations were that Cornerstone would be a close-knit set of homes on a quiet street and that the main house might be a share-house feel, with lots of people coming and going. I figured that there would be a slate of programs going on it would possibly be hectic with people of different socio-economic and physically/mentally disadvantaged hanging out in a community room, sort of like we experienced in our brief visit to Servants in Vancouver. Hosts are certainly difficult to predict but my pre-disposition is to assume some level of eccentricity (although not in a bad way, just refreshingly un-mainstream 😀 ). The reality was different, but the reason is not so much the superficial stuff but the joyful, authentic and committed devotion to community that we experienced. While everyone worked hard, life didn’t revolve around careers, money and day-in-day-out drudgery but rather a variety of new and exciting challenges revolving around people and relationships. And just enjoying life! It’s amazing how much you free yourself up from self-imposed pressure in life that revolves around acquiring and just instead living simply, relying on trust, sharing and neighbors who have the same ethos that you do.

There’s so much more I could say about the nuts and bolts of their community but it would take an essay not a simple blog entry (which is already long enough!). Of course, I think Heidi and I will take comprehensive notes for future reference as – even after only 3 days there – the immediately feeling that these guys were nailing the genuine feeling of how to do community well was abundantly clear. We both agreed that they might be tough to top on this journey! We shall see as the trip unfolds but Cornerstone illustrates exactly what we were hoping to experience on this adventure of discovery! 🙂

(Have a look at Heidi’s excellent blog on her Cornerstone experience as well)

Cornerstone’s community hub

Community hub – cool knitted stuff

Di and Ruth: compact community

~ DESTINATION ONE: STRATHALBYN ~

Community can come in small packages.

In our planning leading up to this little adventure of ours we’ve gone and chosen some communities to visit solely based on a paragraph or two of information via the ic.org website, our WWOOFing book or a brief phone call. Reducing the decision to a small set of “highlights” based on some preconceived ideas of what community is all about will undoubtedly reveal some surprising realities once we arrive, but I’m beginning to believe that this will be the joy of the experience – if we allow it to be that way. Our first community experience has already been that way: before arriving, I had conjured an image of what sort of “true” community could possibly exist between two people, but it has already proven to be an unexpected learning experience.

Heidi, Di and Mike

The baby steps of our 2-month trip took us to the homes of Heidi’s spiritual director Di and her friend Ruth. From the start, Di was comfortable using the term community to describe her and Ruth’s setup: conjoined properties consisting of two houses with no dividing fence and a shared backyard. Ruth and Di, who have been friends for 40 years, move between the two buildings freely but that divide is enough to provide some individual expression and some personal space to be able to retire to whenever they each want it.

So, looking at the way I perceive “community” to mean, I see it as:

a group of people sharing resources to reduce their collective environmental impact and save some redundant expenses;
living in close proximity with one another so that regular interactions are encouraged;
some common interests that connect everyone;
an overall care for one another’s well-being;
having shared experiences with like-minded people that enhance life’s journey

In this context, Di and Ruth are easily covering many of these points, but are simply doing it (at the moment) between the two of them. Their focus might not be so much on environmental concerns, plus having only two people to do everything can have its downsides, but their positive outlook, ease of lifestyle and welcoming hospitality definitely made it feel like they were creating a larger community than just the two of them. I definitely felt like a big warm hug was embracing us while we were there 😀

In planning this trip, we had broken it into roughly two parts: intentional communities and WWOOFing stops. However, I’m now beginning to think that the line is blurred with solid community likely existing in the WWOOFing stops as well. If Di and Ruth are an example of how it can be with just a small community then the places we are looking at who are often connecting with families, other like-minded individuals or the wider community will possibly have a similar feel. In other words, I will try to not place everyone in a tidy box before I experience what their version of community has to offer!

Go forth with an open mind.

Our preconceptions of what we expect to encounter on this trip will certainly colour how we actually experience it, as it was pointed out to us by Michael, a guest at dinner the other night at Di’s home. Michael had traveled extensively through Australia and abroad living communally and was a valuable addition to the conversation. His arrival at this meal was particularly fortuitous as our host Di had happened to bump into him the day that we were visiting and so we could pick his brain a bit regarding our own travels.

The advice Michael provided was useful but was one of the few things he actually told us (as not to contradict his own advice) was: the less we impose our own biases onto an upcoming visit to a community, the more we’ll get out of it. Upon arrival, it’s too easy to initially judge the way things are done by others if they don’t sync with our own methods, but if we wait, listen, learn and absorb, in due time we’ll get a more authentic view of how the community ticks. That’s not to say that our own perspective isn’t valid but it’s easy to arrive somewhere and think “why would they do that like this?” or “this community is broken here and here and I could do it better”.

Saying this, I think I’d like to experiment with my own bias and I plan to write a short paragraph before my forthcoming community visits in which I explain my own expectations and predictions of what the place will be like. I will be basing it solely on what I have read about the place, the vibe I get from any contact I’ve had with them, and my own biases like judgments about animal rearing/eating or lifestyle decisions. Hopefully this will help me examine my own reasons for thinking the way I do and see if I am putting too much emphasis on what’s in my head rather than what I am experiencing with an open mind! More to come…! 🙂

PS. Sorry for the analytical ramble: at this stage things are less about experiences and more about theory!

You can also view Heidi’s take on this visit to Di and Ruth in her blog at Miss Roo’s Adventures

The beautiful town centre of Strathalbyn

Clever Creatures