11/28/11 Starting a commune.

Hey, just end up Homeless in St. Louis and you'll have that option GG.

Rice makes my hair stand up but Reverend Ray is one cool sonofa&^%$ in my book.

But in all fairness to Rice, being a Guy worth a few Million easily and in a room filled wall to wall with Angry Homeless people, I suppose I may give off a sketchy vibe too under those circumstances?

http://www.newlifeevangelisticcenter.org/

**edit The more I look at the website, the more I see they make no mention of their 2 year program they had during my time in St Louis.

A farm focused on Alternative energy production and they are pretty darn self sufficient as far as food goes too, located in New Bloomfield. very Evangellically structured, hence why I'm not there really but the more I think about it, I do miss those fucking baloney sammiches... :cheers2:

 

Great idea.

 

It may be hard to get a full-tilt medical doctor on a commune, but they should at least have someone get EMT or Paramedic training to stabilize someone who gets injured until an ambulance can arrive.

I am not saying that a commune should never take in an eager but untrained newbie.

In my work I recently did a new job that I wouldn't have dreamed of doing.
How did I do it? I was under the supervision of a guy who had done it for 11 years. A few more times and I may be ready to go it alone.
Other skills take more apprenticeship than this, but a lot of these skills could certainly be taught by mentors to apprentices in the form of on-the-job training.

 

Just make sure there's not enough clueless but well meaning souls to out-vote those that know their shit or they might just leave the clueless ones behind on their own for you to deal with.

 

If you guys really pull through with this then I'm def. in, I've been looking for a peaceful commune to settle down at. Need to find one badly

 

That's why one of the names of communes is Intentional Communities.

It might be as simple as having a "get-acquainted" period for both commune and newbie to see if they are a good fit.

Then, the new person can move up to a voting membership if it works out.

There are of course practical limits to how many apprentices, a master tradesman or craftsman can take on at a given time.

But all this can be planned. And yet, spontaneity must be given room to flourish.

The Virginia colony back in the 1600's tried to make a go of raising silkworms and placing them on mulberry trees to start a silk industry to rival the Chinese. It was a HORRIBLE failure, but then they discovered new plants like tobacco and corn grew great there and new markets were discovered that had not even been dreamed of.

 

Man! That's some awesome naked kissing going on!
I am not a "do it in the road" advocate, (I'd finish that lovemaking in a thicket in the woods), but I like the kind of social freedom and tolerance that such a warm embrace represents.

At their best, communes offer:
the economic benefit of shared resources that few could attain on their own.
the freedom of expression that outside culture seldom provides
the chance to learn self-sufficiency skills, crafts and trades that are hard to come by otherwise.

There are communes that crashed and burned for various reasons, but the fact that some failed is no reason to abandon the concept. There are some remarkable success stories to emulate.

 

:cheers2:

 

would you consider northern BC?

 

Just an update on our effert. We have a little land cleared and have partnered with some people from S.C. who are going to put on a month long festival on part of the farm. This is a link to their site and info on what they are doing. http://www.elementalgrow.com/

 

Concensus is indeed the way to go... Majority rules could end up being a popularity vote, or worse... Someone stupid gets all the other stupid people to vote on something stupid and the smart people who know better get overruled. Majority, almost always, is all about popularity and choosing sides.

Land is tricky, I have seen a lot of cheap land but it's very baren. Completely off the grid means you need a fresh water source (river, stream, spring) and a way to get it from point A to point B, easily, and be able to store it through a drought. Then there is the issue of food, will you be farming? Is the ground good enough to farm? What will you need to enrich it? Could be as easilly as burning the brush, and raking it into the soil, or as hard as heavy duty nitrate and fert applications. And the weather--- if it's hot, you will need shelter, if it's cold, you will need shelter, how much sun will you have to deal with on a daily basis, what are the yearly averages, and what sort of home will you be able to make with local resources? How will you raise money for emergency situations, like medication for the ill, and at worse a hospital visit? Off the grid is hard, but not impossible, just gotta think a lot of things through. The medical stuff could be as easy as having someone trained in survival first aid, herbology, or a doctor/med student on your commune.

I WOULD NOT RECOMMEND BURNING THE BRUSH--- instead, take the ashes from your fire pits and put it in your soil... Do test batches, see if it works on a small bit and compare it with an identical situation without the ashes---- if it works, cut up the dead plant after its harvested and toss it on the cooking fire (kbow what plants NOT to burn) and add the ashes to the soil for your next harvest--- many farmers burn their fields after harvest, and work the ash of their last crop into the soil to enrich the next. In these extreme droughts, however, a controlled fire can get WAY out of hand and quickly.