I have really exciting news to share with you this week: Our very own Ma’ikwe will be presenting a TEDx talk called “Sustainable is Possible,” celebrating the very real achievements of Dancing Rabbit and the power of community as a significant part of what makes sustainability possible. She’ll go on stage at Carleton College at about 5pm central time (tune in early just in case it’s earlier so you don’t miss anything) and you can watch it live here: https://client.stretchinternet.com/client/carletonadmin.portal. I’m excited for even more of the world to get turned on to the idea that working together and sharing resources is an important step toward living within our Earthly means.
Hi, Sam here. This week we started with the Contra Culture contra dance weekend–which you read about last week, loyal reader–and ended with our annual anniversary celebration, Land Day. Like a birthday, Land Day helps us set aside a day each year to rejoice in being who we are, to give ourselves a little attention and pampering just because we are… well, just because we are. Also, like a wedding anniversary, it gives us a chance to remember why we started on this journey, with this land, with these people, with the mission we all support with our very lives. We share stories of the very earliest days, remember with some solemnity the strength that comes from unified purpose, and revel in the joy we find in our land and each other.
It was my very own personal birthday, too, this past week. As gifts I received a dance weekend, breakfast in bed, some very special coffee, and from my parents I got a box full of beer and jam made by monks. I so appreciate that my folks are willing to show their love for me with gifts that are consumable, so I don’t have to find room for them in my tiny house for very long, and that come from and support some of the oldest intentional communities in the world. Thanks for your support, mom and dad!
It seems like lately, in addition to celebrating the birth of Dancing Rabbit, and individuals here, there’s also been some grieving. It strikes me how differently different Rabbits experience grief, and life with and through the experience of loss. I’m also touched by how together we come for those who are suffering and ask for support. One aspect of a community as close as Dancing Rabbit, with a culture as open to expressions of an individual’s internal experience, is the benefit we get from the experience of others. We all experience loss. No one has to feel alone in it. That’s one of the things I appreciate the most about Dancing Rabbit.
It’s not all sunshine and butterflies at DR, all the time. We live closely, and sometimes we get on each others’ nerves. We make decisions together and sometimes those decisions don’t feel good to everyone, no matter how hard we try. We share some spaces and some things, and sometimes we have conflicting expectations about the right ways to share. It can happen that we start to talk a lot about what we think is wrong, and get wrapped up in wishing things were different. I find that kind of buzz very draining after a while, and try to avoid it, but recently Alyssa did something even more productive than my duck-and-cover technique: she started asking for “I heart DR” feedback at each WIP. It’s an opportunity to say, publicly, something we love about our community, and I find it very refreshing. Thanks to Alyssa and everyone to has spoken up with a “heart” on those occasions, it does this Rabbit a world of good to hear them.
As usual, plenty of building, gardening, and decision-making is happening around the village. Meta Tron is getting exterior plaster on its straw bales, Toon’s renovating Bella Ciao with new finish plaster, wood trim, and some repairs, Straw Tron is getting closer to being really finished, Sharon and Dennis’s house got some impressive glazing and other work done, the Bean Field gardens are getting put to bed for the winter, harvests are getting put up, over winter crops are getting put in the ground, job descriptions are getting updated and clarified, and people are taking on and setting down jobs and responsibilities. Put even more briefly: life goes on. The Earth rolls around the Sun, people come and people go, and the village grows, a little at a time.