I sit alone in Bella Ciao, swaddled against the cold and wrapped in darkness at the base of a broad windowsill. I pause a moment and prepare myself for a glimpse into Toon’s World of Wonders, a jar filled with water from several ponds at Dancing Rabbit.
Click.
The titanium-white glow of a headlamp filters through the gallon-sized glass jar set before me, casting iridescent patterns of watery shadow onto the earthen walls around me.
As my eyes slowly adjust, I become aware of a plethora of aquatic lifeforms busily coalescing into strata disturbed by my intrusion. I study their behaviors, marking the characteristics of each wee beastie by increasingly minute degrees.
An almond-shaped crustacean swims frantically past half-submerged fragments of gnarled driftwood, unable to escape the parasitic embrace of a leech nursing at its back. Snails scrub oxygen-producing algae from the slick surface of the glass, while swarms of black mosquito larvae wriggle where air and water meet, oblivious to the circuitous business of a chili-red beetle in their midst. Opalescent fairy-shrimp, like motes of dust spotlighted in a sunbeam, strive on gossamer wings toward the brilliant halo of the flashlight’s fiery filament.
As I marvel at this captivating microcosm, retrospection leads to awe – and wondering. I wonder what consciousness might be like for Toon’s Lilliputians. I wonder whether beings on distant worlds orbiting unknown stars have thoughts like mine.
Hey y’all, Resident Vick here – sit with me by the fire as the days grow shorter, the nights grow colder and autumn ushers in the final frenzy of the harvest season.
This week was the last for our most recent group of visitors to the village and I am delighted to have spent a great deal of time with them during their stay. Our conversations often dwelt on the subject of intentional community, and as the week progressed I found myself repeatedly consociating Toon’s microcosm with the village here at Dancing Rabbit. Maybe I’m just anthropomorphizing fairy-shrimp, but I see new parallels all the time.
Our visitors, for instance, are a diverse class of organisms adapting to a new environment, each of them in search of the niche for which they are best suited. I watched as they made subtle adjustments to their behaviors following some new insight they had gained in one of our workshops.
I listened with relish to their wildest ambitions and most cherished dreams as they speculated about the roles they might play in our particular human ecosystem. My imagination reeled with the many possibilities ahead for Dancing Rabbit in its ongoing evolution as a community.
When several members of the visitor group decided to apply for residency, I realized that their arrival will mimic genetic mutation in our population, introducing new material to the pool of ideas, experience, and knowledge available to us right now. I can’t wait to see what new things they bring, as we pursue our mission to share sustainability with the world.
Dancing Rabbit is a microcosm, but we are also part of a global network of people. The March on Climate Change took place in New York City and around the world this week, and at Dancing Rabbit we participated in this global demonstration with a solidarity event on Sunday. Knowing that millions of people share a piece of our mission fills me with hope, and stopping disastrous climate change is only phase one – our potential is much greater than that.
The first electric car rolled down a Scottish road in 1839 – I wonder how 175 years of research and creative thought could have altered our situation today. Project Orion would sweep up the world’s nuclear warheads and use them to propel us to the stars, where we may find new worlds of wonder to explore, like Toon’s jar on a windowsill.
In less cosmic news, we’re gearing up for our annual Open House and Village Fair, this Saturday Sept 27th, from 1- 4 pm. Free tours happen every half hour, and there will be lots of friendly Dancing Rabbit folks on hand to answer questions, a Village Fair selling unique crafts and goods, and some complimentary refreshments. See our website or Facebook Event page for details. Hope to see many of you there!
• • •
Dancing Rabbit Ecovillage is an intentional community and nonprofit outside Rutledge, in northeast Missouri, focused on demonstrating sustainable living possibilities. Find out more about us by visiting our website, reading our blog, or emailing us.