O, from this time forth, my thoughts be bloody, or be nothing worth!

sometimes I feel very seen

We went to see Hamlet Hail to the Thief last weekend, and it was thrilling. I've never really been one for Shakespeare -- I can see there are stories in there that embody the "nothing new under the sun" message, and I can also see how valuable it is to have those stories, but, mostly, yawn. Too many words, too much leaping around, too much declaiming. I've seen a few of the more famous plays, live and on film, and I studied a few more at school, but they just don't reach me. And it's not that I'm unreachable, is my logic, so it's not on me. If I ever got to go on Desert Island Discs, I'd ask for the complete works of Ursula Le Guin instead. 

But HHttT (as no one called it) was immense. I have seen the full Hamlet twice, so I know how many of the lines are part of the culture, and this seemed to concentrate around the highlights and make them make sense. With additional bonuses of a) incredible physical energy (there was quite a lot of dance) and b) a killer soundtrack (there is little Radiohead I don't love). I laughed out loud several times, and had to look through my fingers several more, and this is rare for me at plays. To be fair I don't go to that many -- the first one I went to that wasn't a school or university performance I tried to leave at the interval because I thought it was finished, so I guess I'm just not much of a thesp. 

I've been thinking about what reached me, and why, and what other recent things have reached me, and why, in the light of my current exploration of the snakes and the ladders. Some of the other recent things include a Richard Dawson gig which I only bought a ticket for on the night, a visit to Levens Hall, a bowl of Bun Bo La Lot at Salvation in Noodles in Finsbury Park, a Lego Serious Play workshop for some of my colleagues that I made happen (and got to attend), a wine-soaked conversation punctuated with birdsong on someone else's riverfront terrace, and a walk with my beloved across the Lots in Silverdale as the sun was setting over Morecambe Bay.

I live, and have generally lived, a life suffused with things that reach me. I want to be reached, and I want to be part of things that reach other people. I think that's important, when I talk about the snakes and the ladders. It really fucking matters to me, the reaching. And I mean reach (and this will come up again later, kids) with good intent. That can mean challenging. That should sometimes mean challenging. Of me, as I am reached, and of others, if I reach them. Or it can mean joy. Or comfort. But if it makes you think, that doesn't make it bad. In my view. If it makes you a little uncomfortable, ditto. 

This musing is prompted, or maybe accelerated, by the fact that here in Ecoville there is a new Common House Floor Cleaning Rota and a new six month rota for the regular cleaning jobs, and as usual (since forever) my name is not on the former and as usual (since 2020) my name is not on the latter. I really thought this time round I'd feel like I could sign up for a job like some of the jobs I used to do -- I have never been able to approach the kitchen but I used to change towels, clean windowsills and communal toilets, tidy shelves, look after the washing machines. 

I'm not the only person whose name doesn't appear on those rotas (I can guess at some other people's reasons, but I'm not going to speculate on them here) and this does cause issues. If it was literally just me, the community impact would not be that great, everything would get done, some people would think less of me, I would accept that, in the sense that getting me back on the rota would not really be worth any community effort. Just leave her be, she's a weird one. 

I'd still be sad, because I am reachable, and my conscience combined with my female socialisation means that I feel bad not being on the rota, but not as bad as being on the rota would make me feel.* Lots of people not being on the rota makes me feel a bit worse, because I think it's hard on the people who do their bit, but then maybe they like it that way, I don't know. 

Because we don't talk about it. Not really. 

But I can. As I said in the trailer, I've been working some of this through in the light of my (very late! go patriarchy! thanks menopause!) autism diagnosis. If you are unfamiliar with some of the dimensions of autistic thought and communication, there's a reasonable summary here. I would say my need for clarity is intense, and couples with my strong justice sensitivity  And one of the biggest WTF elements for me these last couple of years has been the slowly then all at once realisation that for a lot of people, clarity and justice are not nearly as important as everyone being nice to the people who expect people to be nice to them** (I can't even work out how you know who those people are, except by counting my bruises when I hit a nerve that was supposed to be clearly marked "do not discuss"). 

One way this manifests is that I experience fudging as oppression. I therefore want to fight it, and if I can't express myself in words out loud, I'll find another way to do it. Honestly, it's a relief to know this. 

Sometimes that's in t-shirts: the photo above was taken by a neighbour (also a friend and confidante) at one of our General Meetings (GMs). For many years I barely missed a GM: I believed they were where we made decisions, and I believed (in the words of President Bartlet) that decisions are made by the people who show up. You have to be in the room, I thought, because that is the way to ensure that your views are represented. So I made a lot of effort to be in the room. Before we moved in, that represented hundreds of pounds of effort a month, as we had to travel here from Oxford. After, it was more emotional effort: some meetings sent me to bed for the rest of the day. 

I don't believe that anymore, not fundamentally. My loss of faith in consensus decision making is a whole separate post, and a whole separate sadness, as for a long time I was like well, fuck, this is how everyone should do stuff. You don't get 52:48 votes changing the course of history if you're working with consensus -- you have to keep going till you find something that everyone can live with. But it really doesn't work if you are conflict averse, and it really doesn't work if you won't examine your power dynamics. 

More on that another time, but basically I got burnt bad when my intent was good, and I don't react well when that happens. It feels in my head like a portcullis slams down. I can still see the place that I used to be able to hang out, but I can't get there anymore, so I have to adapt. Annoyingly, it's a surprise every time. You'd think I'd learn, but I'm an earnest little bean. 

Adapting often takes the form of withdrawal, but I still need to find a way to express myself -- I need the pressure release valve if I am not to explode with the injustice of everything. This is, I think, what my Ecoville blog posts have often been about. And sometimes I can get myself back in the room, which is how I found myself in a General Meeting where we were ostensibly talking about conflict. I have stuff to say about this, I thought. Finally! 

I am pretty sure my T-shirt choice that day was deliberate, but it was not conscious. I have a bunch of T-shirts that are (arguably) provocative. At least two of them have fish on them, and one just has the word UNAPOLOGETIC. I bought this green one at a Cypress Hill gig, and really for the front of it (which says Cypress Hill in the Rizla font) than for the back. It's a cracking song though. 

But anyway, there I was, wearing it, and there was the session about conflict, and there was the list of ways you might approach it and we were invited to decide which we identified with and I was standing there looking at it, thinking "where's I protest?". My approach to conflict is not on this list! But, as captured so beautifully by E, I was literally wearing it on my body. 

🎵 It's a sin to kill a man / But I'll be damned if I don't take a stand 🎵

(Note: I would almost certainly not actually kill anyone) 

We had a genteel conflict avoidant conversation about conflict, I'm not sure whose needs were satisfied, but mine weren't. A straw poll indicated that a majority of the people who had got themselves into the room that day saw "conflict" as something we should pay attention to. That was 10 months ago, and I see absolutely fucking zero evidence that we have. 

Jo, I hear myself saying, you could take a lead on this! Yeah, I hear myself saying, look what happened last time you tried taking a lead on this! And the time before. And the time all you did was try and support the other person who was trying to take a lead on this. Et fucking cetera. 

We could say that we only value people who Don't Make A Fuss, Clean The Floors, and are happy to Go Along With Not Upsetting A Specific Group Of People***. We could say that, and I sort of wish that we would, it would be at least helpful for those of us who appreciate clarity. Those of us who have been here for a while once received a printout in our mailboxes about the value of duct tape (over your mouth) and work gloves for new community members****. While this is almost the dictionary definition of passive aggression, when you are actually new it's not terrible advice, especially if you are a white cishet man. 

But if we're talking about the "living phase" as opposed to the "build phase" -- we were literally here second. We did some really fucking hard yards. And even for a lot of the softies who arrived after we had a postcode and a car club and wi-fi and a laundry, they were still basically in at the beginning. How many years till you're allowed to have views? Five? 10? 

To round this post off (I'm trying to keep them at a digestible length) I have learnt that where I live I am seen as difficult and challenging and upsetting, and at times not acceptable. And I felt bad about that for quite a while. I don't try to be those things, except occasionally when I have reached my tolerance limits, or drunk a whole bottle of red (I often go from warm fuzzy to cold fury somewhere between glasses three and four, but this is why I left the community WhatsApp). 

You should hear my inside voice. Honestly, I work hard in a world full of dissembling and fudge, and only occasionally go pop, though fair to say that when I do, we're cleaning it off the walls for years (well, I'm not, as I'm not on the rota). 

As one of my neighbours (who literally rubs my words out every time I write them on a blackboard) bellowed at me once, maybe I should... MOVE OUT!! And I've thought about it. But I love my house, and a lot of my other neighbours are awesome. When virtue signalling was more overt here than it is currently, someone declaimed that we ran the risk of just being a bunch of middle class people living in nice houses by a river. Maybe that's what I am, me and my refusal to clean the floor, but you know, I tried. Another one of them once said "We've (that magic we again) tried very hard to meet your needs". You haven't though, you've never even asked me what they are. 

But I can write about them here, and maybe that will help. Or not, but it will help me, and that's better than a slap in the face with a wet fish. 

joella

*There's always the option of being on the rota but not doing the thing -- I am unable to do this one, I find unilateral active transgression almost impossible. 

**These are usually the power holders in a situation (though not all power holders etc). This can cover unconscious entitlement, extreme wealth, cult leadership, and many things in between. 

*** I have a list of the people who refused to agree the agenda of a meeting that contained some proposals they did not even want to hear. This was an organised exercise and there were 13 of them. Maybe half of them were foot soldiers recruited by the officer class. I'm cool with them, it's hard to say no to that kind of thing if you are asked to pick a team. The officers, I watch. When one of them leaves, I have a silent disco. 

**** This was an excerpt from Finding Community by Diana Leafe Christian. Who visited here once. Lunch was vegan, but my beloved cooked her an omelette. 

Snakes and Ladders

I've started to write this series of posts multiple times, I have scraps and fragments in drafts, in notebooks, in late night voice notes I've sent to myself . I've wanted to write it for years. I've trailed it more than once, hoping that would give me the juice to get going. But every time, it's run into the sand. 

I'm hoping this time will be different, because I have Done Some Work on why I want to write it and what's getting in the way. I think I'll start there. 

Snakes and Ladders is one of the framings I've used over the last few years to think about my life in Ecoville. If I reach square 100, I clean the Common House floor. This is something we are all supposed to do a couple of times a year - there's a rota and everything. 

I have never cleaned the Common House floor. I have also never paid anyone to clean the Common House floor for me, which is one way to avoid cleaning the Common House floor. It's not that I wouldn't clean the Common House floor, I can see that it needs to be cleaned, I am capable of cleaning it. It's not even a job I would find that unpleasant, in and of itself. 

But I never get to square 100, so I can't. I've come close a few times, but then I've hit a snake. 

The dice in this game of snakes and ladders is just life -- things that come along in the course of a day or a week or a month. Things you have to deal with. We're all rolling the dice, all the time. Am I going to go for a walk? Should I catch up on my emails? Is it time to do the laundry? In an intentional community, even the most basic level of "just life" involves other people, that's kind of the idea. We have meetings and make decisions and run into each other by the mailboxes and share cars (some of us) and meals (some of us) and hang out in various permutations and combinations. You can totally be an introvert here, but you can't be an isolationist. 

Sometimes, there are ladders. Someone is kind in a way you didn't expect, something works out in a way that is deeply pleasing for all involved, serendipity delivers an outcome that is fully greater than the sum of its parts. We put some of the conditions in place to encourage and enable these things, and we work to maintain them, but they are no less delightful as a result. Wow, I say, when I zoom up a ladder, look what we did! Aren't we lucky to live here! Isn't it worth all of the... 

...Snakes. Oh, the snakes. The snakes, for me, are mostly the things I didn't see coming. The feedback. The accusations. The behaviours that make it entirely, devastatingly clear that person x doesn't trust you and quite possibly never did, but never said. The cloaking of dogma in appreciative inquiry. The unspoken, unwritten red lines that you don't know about till you cross them. The use of "us" and "we" in a way that doesn't have you in it. 

I struggle with the snakes because I don't understand them. And that's why I want to write this, because I want to understand them, and writing is one of the ways I do that. I don't think we all have to like each other. I'd kind of worry if we did. And I know that I personally can be a bit Marmite -- I struggle with small talk, I don't really do 'nice', I swear freely, I give direct answers to direct questions. I like to make myself laugh, I like to make other people laugh. I'm not always as kind as I could be. But I'm not devious. I'd be a terrible politician. 

I think that might be at the heart of it. I certainly think it's worth exploring. In terms of what's been stopping me, it's partly writing discipline and partly fear of feedback. (#notallfeedback - I also know a lot of people have found things that I write helpful). 

On the former, I've just reduced my working hours to give me a bit more time for mental and physical exercise each week. On the latter, I have been seeing a therapist for a while to help me process my autism diagnosis. And we talk about feedback a lot. I don't have to take it on board if I don't think it's valid. And I have taken a lot on board: I like to write for an audience, but it needs to be a willing one. Some folk just ain't going to like what I have to say, and I shouldn't push it at them. It's a lot harder to get here than it used to be, and I did that on purpose. 

So let's fucking go. That floor's not going to clean itself.

joella