The Porcupine Saga, Part 5, One Last Lecture, Part 2

Allan Harper, late afternoon, Tuesday, April 9, 2030

Allan Harper checked the time on his phone and cancelled the alarm he had set. If his dad was serious about keeping to a 15 minute break, it was time to be getting back inside. He climbed the steps and went in through the back door of the old farm house, then down the hall to the addition.

"Allan, could you stick you head out the door and call people in?" asked Tom.

"Sure thing Dad," said Allan, turning around to retrace his path to the top of the steps where he called out in a voiced pitched to carry. "Break's over folks, time to come back in."

A few minutes later everyone had returned to their seats in the addition, many with cups or tall glasses of various beverages. Clearly Karen, Allan's mom, had been busy. And probably prepared ahead of time, if Allan knew her at all.

Allan also noticed that the youngest person in the group, the Janes' ten year old son, had been supplied with a stack of books and a box of toys. This lecture Tom was giving was probably pretty boring for the little guy, so it was good to have something to pass the time. Allan rather envied him.

Tom resumed his place at the white board. "Well, during the break I did some quick and dirty polling," he said, "and it seems that, despite having some questions, everyone is on side with my three basic points. That's reassuring" He gestured at the white board where he had listed those points.

Allan noticed that no one objected—it seemed his father had it right.

"I'm beginning to get a better idea of how my presentation today should go, which is good since I'm already about a third of the way through it," said Tom. The audience laughed politely at this bit of self-deprecation and he smiled in response."I can see it's going to fall into three parts. Before the break we talked about how collapse is real, that we can adapt to it, and that the best adaptation is based on community self sufficiency. This second section is going to be mainly about economics and ecology—how this self-sufficient community is going to work. The third section, after supper, we'll talk about specifics of organization and governance—other things we'll have to provide for ourselves."

"So, how is our community going to work?" asked Tom and paused for effect.

"We are now in the midst of a serious economic depression. Capitalism, which we have relied on to provide us with the necessities of life, is failing, and nothing has been organized as yet to replace it. Many of us have found ourselves in a tough spot and we've come here seeking refuge from the storm that has gripped our world.

"But we are creatures of habit and if we don't watch out, we're likely to set things up in the same old way that isn't working, without even realizing that's what we are doing. Before the break I talked about how our community will be egalitarian and based on the principles of primitive communism. I think I neglected to mention that we'll use direct democracy to govern ourselves, possibly because I'll cover it in the third section. But it is another basic element of what I hope we can do here.

"I think these three elements constitute a really strong foundation for our new community. They imply a lot about how that community will function, and by following those implications we can avoid falling into the same old pitfalls. So, I have some ideas about how this should go. As before, I've discussed most of this with at least some of you, in bit and pieces, and now I'll try to bring it all together in one piece, for the whole group."

Tom paused to write on the white board: "Refuge from Capitalistic Society—must be a non-capitalistic society".

"OK, I'm going to start in what may seem like a strange place," said Tom. "And that is with the size of groups we'll be living and working in. The possibilities we will be looking at are: individuals, dyads (two people), crews (three to five people), communes (15 to 150 people) and networks of communes.

"The society we are leaving has pretty much settled on the individual as the only unit of organization when it comes to people. In many ways, the large hierarchical organizations that those individuals work in aren't really human at all. So that's it, just individuals. They're easier to dominate and manipulate, so today's corporations and governments discourage the other sizes of groups. Even dyads, long the basis for fruitful partnerships of many types, are suffering in that society.

"Those other sizes of group have some big advantages and by not using them, conventional society is missing out on a lot of opportunities, of which we will take full advantage. Our basic organizational unit will be the commune, a grouping that is almost completely absent in our society. It brings together enough people to make self-sufficiency possible and to constitute a functioning community. And it allows those people to form the dyads and crews we'll need to accomplish things individuals can't on their own.

"A commune is large enough so that it can be a little cumbersome, so much of the action within our commune will be accomplished by crews. A crew is big enough to make a major contribution but small enough to so it's members can all be on the same page without using any sort of formal organization. Some of our crews will be doing actual physical jobs, others will be assigned to devise answers to questions that would take the whole group forever to discuss.

"The pair bond is evolved right into human beings, so dyads are also a very effective size of group, and sufficient for many jobs. The idea of partnership is basic to dyads, and we'll extend it to the larger groups as well. Sadly we are used to basing relations on dominance and submission. This is a major source of injustice and something we will want to avoid.

"Someday, years down the road, we can hope that others will adopt our approach and we can have a network of communes similar to ours."

Tom turned to the white board and wrote, "Organizational units: the commune, the crew, the dyad and the individual. Someday, a network of communes".

As a tradesman, Allan had done some work in crews and knew how effective they could be, even in a capitalistic organization. Communes were a new thing for him, though he had to admit that this particular one seemed to be working OK, so far.

"I would have thought extended families would have an import role to play here," said Jim MacGregor, "but you haven't even mentioned them at all."

"I have nothing against extended families," said Tom, "clearly, since I have both children and grandchildren in this room. They say it takes a village to raise a child and a commune can play that role. But I didn't mention extended families because capitalism uses families, be they nuclear or extended, to do the reproductive labour required to maintain society without any support from the capitalists. Even though they clearly benefit from that labour, they have externalized it from their own organizations and left the burden sitting squarely on the family.

"This is actually a pretty good example of one of those habits we want to avoid. We'll want to strongly support those who bear, raise and educate our children. And how we do this may end up look quite different from the traditional family. It will be interesting to see what develops."

"Oh," said Jim, "I guess I am an old fashioned guy and I hadn't thought of it that way. But I do see what you mean."

"Great," said Tom. "we all have some work ahead of us when it comes to following those implications I was talking about.

"Anyway, next we need to look at economics. We're used to spending our time working for capitalists, producing commodities or services. Even those of us who are self-employed end up working for the capitalists at the bank. So, they sell those commodities and services, and use some of the money they receive to pay us for our labour, at the lowest rate they can get away with. The rest they keep, to re-invest in their businesses or in other areas for the best return they can manage, always aiming to accumulate more wealth. Having 'enough' simply doesn't enter into it

"Because we've had a consumer economy, if wealth is to be accumulated goods and services must be produced and consumed, regardless of whether they are actually needed or not. Indeed a lot of effort is expended to create artificial demand for whatever the capitalists are set up to produce. This is known as "supply push". And it, along with the endless accumulation of wealth by capitalists, results in our impact on the planet being much heavier than it really needs to be.

"Here we have a different goal, and we will be adopting a very different approach," said Tom. "That goal is surviving, and surviving well. Our labour will be used to supply our needs—water, food, clothing, housing. Once those are taken care of, we'll see to other needs that are less urgent, but still very real. I would encourage us not to fuss much over the gray areas—if we decide to put our time and effort into a thing, we should call it a need. We'll make things (and services) because we need them—this is known as "demand pull", and it has the potential to put us in a situation of abundance that has a much smaller impact on the planet than a supply push economy—we'll only make what we need, and don't have to support the continuous drain of wealth accumulation by capitalists."

"But exactly how would such a demand pull economy work?" asked Tom. "Remember that we want to base it on communistic rather than capitalistic ideals.

"I'll start with ownership and property. Ownership is one of those artificial concepts that has become central to our society. But there is nothing fundamentally real about the concept of owning things. It is one of the fictions that is accepted by everyone as necessary to making society work. What it actually does is make things work for the 1% at the top. In fact, you own the things you can hold onto. Our laws, courts and the police exist largely to help the rich hold onto what they think of as their own. Some benefit does slop over into the middle and lower classes, but if you've ever had something stolen and called the police, you've seen how small that benefit really is."

"I didn't bring much with me, Grandpa," said Tom's step-granddaughter Andrea, "but aren't some of the people here going to be pretty upset if you take away all their stuff?"

"Not so far, Andrea. But then I'm not actually taking away all their stuff," answered Tom. "Let me explain. Property comes in three varieties: personal, private and collective. Personal property includes, at the very least, things like your clothes, shoes, toothbrush and nostalgic items like family photos and keepsakes. You came here with it and you get to keep it. I suspect we'll also come up with a list of personal necessities that we'll supply for everyone, as some people are going to arrive with little more than the clothes on their backs.

"But, in the society we have left behind, a typical household has a lot of stuff that I guess you'd consider personal property. Take the kitchen for example—each household has a whole bunch of appliances, equipment, cutlery, china and so forth. We're going to have one central kitchen that looks after everybody and eliminates a whole lot of duplication of personal property. Another example would be guys like me having a well outfitted shop with a bunch of power tools that get used pretty rarely. We're going to have a 'maker space' and a tool library which eliminates a lot of duplication in those areas."

"There is a somewhat fuzzy line between personal and private property, and no doubt we'll spend some time over the next few months discussing exactly where that line should fall. One of the definitions of private property is that you use it to increase your private wealth. Of course, as a member of our commune, you don't have private wealth, so you don't need private property.

"The third type of property—collective property—belongs to us all," said Tom, " and much of the property that we are 'taking away' falls into this category. You won't be losing it, just sharing it."

"Ask anybody here," said Andrea, "we can all tell stories about common property that get's abused, broken, stolen and so forth."

"I know what you mean," replied Tom. "I've seen those things happen too—in an organization I was in charge of, actually. Close examination has lead me to believe that the people involved didn't really feel any responsability for the stuff in question or expect any consequences when they abused it. Here, the common stuff belongs to us all and that means it belongs to you. If it gets broken or lost, the replacement comes out of a common pool of resources. Resources that could have been used for something else that you wanted instead.

"On the other hand, it's important to remember that, in the normal course of events, things do break and get lost and not to get too worked up about it."

"Yeah, you got some good points there, Grandpa," said Andrea.

"Thanks, Andrea," said Tom. "The next thing is work and money. In the world we are leaving you work to get money so you can buy the necessities of life, but with no guarantee that what you earn will be enough. This doesn't apply here, as the commune provides those necessities. Still, we are all going to do some work as part of our lives here. At a minimum, this will be the work that's needed to provide for all of us.

"I am not proposing that we get paid for this or any other work we do here," said Tom. "Indeed I am quite certain that we don't need to use money internally at all. This place will work just fine without it. And I am not suggesting we replace money with some sort of barter system or even a time keeping system. I don't believe that we need to formally keep track of how much each of us does—indeed we'll be better off if we don't. We should switch from extrinsic rewards like wages to intrinsic rewards like knowing that you are helping the members of your community and doing a good job of it.

"For most of our history (or perhaps I should say prehistory) barter and trading (commerce, if you will) were something you did only with strangers and usually with an eye to, as my dad used to say, 'putting one over one them'. When dealing with the members of your own community, you simply shared and did what was needed to make sure everyone had enough.

"In one sense, money is just a set of tokens used to keep score in the complex game that is our economy. Energy is what really makes an economy work, and we'll have our own renewable sources of energy here, mainly firewood. So money in this sense won't be very important to us.

"But in another sense, money is used by the rich to make more money, and control everyone else. In the society we are leaving, money severely limits our options because there is so little we can do without it, and borrowing has become the only way to get enough money to do anything significant. Because it is created via debt and must be paid back with interest, money drives the continual growth of the economy. Having abandoned money we will have eliminated the need for on-going growth and once again reduced our impact on the planet.

"I believe we will find this approach involves less effort to secure the necessities of life. Less than the regular jobs we've been working at, for sure. I think we'll also find it will take less energy and fewer material resources. And it should be much less of a pain in the ass, since we'll be working as part of a partnership we've voluntarily agreed to, rather because some idiot above us in a hierarchy tells us to."

On the board Tom wrote, "Eliminate money, accounting, banking, debt, and the need for growth." On the next line he wrote, "Personal, Private and Collective property." And then stroked out "private".

As a union member, and in his most recent job a union organizer, Allan had developed a pretty strong class consciousness, so he had no problem with this kind of talk. Others weren't so quick to accept.

"That doesn't sound fair," said Nora McGregor, a slim, gray haired women wearing glasses, who was, if Allan remembered correctly, a retired elementary school teacher, "if the most competent people give their all, they'll end up contributing a lot more than lazier or less capable people."

"Fair is only in fairy tales," replied Tom with a grin, which drew a frown from Nora. "But seriously, it is true that some will do more for the community than others. Hell, some of us could probably make a go of it as an isolated individual or family, without the need for a community. But it would be really hard. As members of this community, those exceptional people will have a much easier go of it than they otherwise would. They will be significantly ahead of where they'd be without the community.

"Indeed, none of us should have to go full out on an ongoing basis, or this isn't going to work. Without capitalistic waste, and with the force multiplier of mutual aid, we should all have some time for the things we love to do, and even to be a little lazy. Laziness should not be discouraged when there isn't much to do, and we will set things up so there are times when there isn't much to do, as we have no need to over produce or over consume.

"That's how it worked for the most competent people in those egalitarian bands. They did contribute more, and were expected to share with others who contributed less. If they got uppity about it, they were made fun of, slapped down, and in extreme cases encouraged to go elsewhere."

"The more you say, the worse it sounds to me," said Nora.

"Look, we've all been taught to accept this odd idea of fairness—that if we work hard we'll be compensated fairly, and if we don't, we haven't earned any reward," said Tom. "This is intended to keep our noses to the grindstone, but the only people who really benefit are the capitalists who are exploiting us. It is not fair at all and it totally ignores some of our basic human rights—I mean, what are the people who haven't managed to earn a reward, frequently through no fault of their own, supposed to do?

"We are so immersed in ableism and meritocracy that working to help our community, even if some of its members haven't 'earned' it, sounds backwards to us. But I'll tell you it is the most forward thing you'll ever find. Who would you rather help? Your family, friends and neighbours who genuinely need your help, and most of whom help you as much as they can, or rich people who just want to get richer and don't give a damn about you?"

"When you put it that way," replied Nora, "maybe it's worth a try. We'll see how it goes, anyway."

"Indeed we will," said Tom, and turned to write, "Eliminate ableism and meritocracy. Guarantee basic human rights"

"If my analysis is right, you'll find that on average you'll be working something like 32 hours a week," said Tom. "About half of that will be on 'shit jobs'—work that needs to be done whether you like it or not. You'll do it because you recognize that it does need to be done and if not by you, then who? The other half of will be spent doing what you want to do to help the community. Of course, there will be lumps in the work load, busy times when everyone is working long hard days, and slack times with the opportunity to take it easy.

"Fortunately the forces of capitalism have been sufficiently weakened by the depression that we are going to be able to try all this out without the opposition you would usually expect, and without enacting any formal land reforms," said Tom. "Provided we keep a low profile, and don't stir up trouble the local government or the police, that is.

"Since the start of the depression in the fall of 2028, the offshore capitalists that technically owned this land have disappeared. They are not answering their phones and have stopped paying their taxes and stopped renting the land out to local farmers for cash cropping. The depression has hurt those farmers, leaving many them in no position to plant a crop, even if they were inclined to do so without a formal rental agreement, so we don't have much competition for use of the land hereabouts. The hundred acres we're sitting on was for sale for back taxes. Of the other nine hundred acres in this concession, seven hundred are in circumstances similar to this farm and two hundred are owned by a farmer who is my age and I suspect would like to retire. We should approach him soon.

"As the depression deepens and governments at all levels lose more and more of their ability to project force and control the situation, we may well be able to just squat on much of this land without paying taxes—making good use of it, rather than letting it just be taken over by thorn brush. And hopefully using what we produce on the land to help those less fortunate in the local community.

"It's a bit of a wild ass guess, but I've been basing my thinking on needing around five acres to support each person," said Tom. "You hear people talking about needing as little as a quarter of an acre, but that is for a vegetable garden only. I'm including producing firewood, building materials, fiber, vegetable oil and alcohol as fuel, as well as food. Add in some scrap metal and we should be pretty much self-sufficient. Of course, this year, until the first harvest starts to come in, we'll continue to buy food and other necessities. And initially we'll have to spend some money on tools, equipment, seeds, nursery stock and livestock."

On the board Tom wrote, "Informal Land Reform, facilitating Self-Sufficiency"

Working five acres of land sounded to Allan like something that might take more than 32 hours per week to work. He was about to speak up when his step-son Miles beat him to it.

"Grandpa Tom ," said Miles, "how do you figure 32 hours a week is going to be enough to take care of five acres of land?"

"Because more than half of that five acres is going to be in woodlot, supplying us with building materials and firewood," said Tom, "of the rest, some is going to be in orchards, field crops, pasture and hay, which we'll work mainly using machinery, driven by tractors or work horses. So this brings us back to about a quarter of an acre of vegetable garden, and even there much of the work can be with machinery."

"Oh," said Miles, " I thought you meant five acres of garden—twenty times as much as that quarter acre. But even a quarter acre is a square a little over a hundred feet on a side. That's still a pretty big garden."

"I won't argue with you there, Miles," said Tom. "It's never been clear to me whether that's supposed to be a quarter acre per person or per family. I grew up on a farm, and we had about a third of an acre of garden, where we grew most of the vegetables for a family of five. So a quarter of an acres is probably a generous estimate. Still, there will be times—planting, weeding, harvest—when some long days will be required of many of us. But averaged over the year, gardening doesn't add up to anywhere near 32 hours a week, so we'll have lots of time for all the other things that need doing."

Miles let it go at that, but a short and curvy young woman spoke up, "So as you say, at the start, we'll be buying more than we produce. Where are we going to get all the money for that?"

Alan thought for a moment and remembered being introduced to her as Angie Ferguson, a hair stylist.

"Money raises its ugly head again... well, I guess I may not have explained this to everyone yet," said Tom, "I expect that the majority of people seeking refuge here will come with little more than they can carry—personal property only and little or no financial resources of any sort. That is the point of having a refuge, after all. But the older folks in this room did come with somewhat more— savings, investments, and pensions—the usual government pensions for those who are over 65, and in a couple of cases, company pensions earned during our working days. These are private property and have already been signed over to our collective.

"So, with those resources, it looks like we've got enough income to keep us all fed and otherwise cared for until the crops start coming in. Also to buy what we'll need in the way of seeds, tools and so forth, and to pay the property taxes on this farm. Some of us have brought part of what's needed with us, and that will save us quite a bit of money."

"Good for you. And good of you older folks to be so generous," said Angie.

"Well, I have to admit we are not altogether altruistic in this," said Tom. "Realistically, if the depression continues as we expect it will, we're looking at those pensions getting discounted soon and eventually disappearing altogether. Our investments won't be reliable either. So we wanted to 'use them before we lose them', so to speak—to create something that we can count to support us as we get older, even if our civilization collapses."

"And in the setup you've been describing, us younger folks will provide that support," said Angie. "Not a bad deal either, since none of us have the resources to set up a place like this on our own, and there will be only a few of you and lots of us."

"I'm glad to hear you feel that way," Tom replied. "though I'm not keen on us being divided into 'you and us'."

"Just a figure of speech," said Angie.

Allan hoped it was. He could see real problems arising if a rift developed between those who had bank rolled the operation and those who ended up doing most of the work. It didn't need to turn out that way, but it easily could.

"Do you think we'll ever be able to make everything we need?" asked a muscular man in who appeared to be in his thirties.

He'd been introduced to Allan as Don McPherson, a fitter mechanic who did blacksmithing and foundry work as a hobby. Clearly a useful fellow to have, and with a keen interest in "making".

"That's mostly a matter of how you define need, " replied Tom, "and how much in the way of money, material resources and effort we're willing to put into any particular thing. At least here we'll have a much better idea of the real cost of things than we did as part of consumer society. Very soon we should start working on a wish list. This, I am sure, will spark much discussion about what we can produce here and what we really need. Some things may always be beyond our reach—solid state electronics and the high end of pharmaceutical and medical tech come to mind."

"I'd agree with you there," Don said, "and I'd add in plastics and rubber, and possibly electricity itself. But maybe that's because those things are outside my 'wheelhouse', so to speak."

Allan, an electrician himself, wondered if he should speak up, but Tom beat him to it. "As an electrician, I can tell you that electricity really isn't that hard. The hard part is providing energy for the prime mover that spins a generator. Even without solid state electronics, we can use wind, solar thermal and of course, firewood. This may not get us the essentially infinite amounts of power that we're used to, but enough for the basics. Electricity is so useful, especially for things like pumping water, refrigeration, lighting and operating power tools, that I have no doubts we'll find a way to generate some. Not just today, but in the future when all our store bought generators have broken down and we have to build our own."

"Oh, for sure," said Don. "Our current level of technology looks like magic to many people, and it is supported by a global network of such complexity that it might fall apart if any one link fails. But there are suites of technologies that require much smaller and simpler networks. With already existing tools and knowledge, and the extensive opportunities for salvage that currently present themselves, we are in a much better position than those who developed those technologies in the first place."

"Absolutely, Don," agreed Tom, "and the rest of us will be relying on folks like you to make such ideas a reality. Especially since that global network seems ready to collapse at any moment. Thinking about that sort of thing, it's going to be interesting to see how long our governments can continue funding it's new dental and pharma plans, as well as the medical system, and how long much of the technology involved will be available. At some point we're going to have to start doing that sort of thing for ourselves, and it will be a big challenge, especially since most alternative medicine simply doesn't work. In any case, I hope we will be able to attract mlore pharmaceutical and medical people in the near future.

"It might surprise you to know that we already have among us a person who has worked in the biotech industry—my daughter-in-law Erika. She has brought with her a couple of strains of gene tailored bacteria. One produces insulin. I don't think we have anyone at the moment who is insulin dependent, but it's bound to happen as we welcome in more people. The other produces chymosin, an enzyme used in cheese making. She has connections in the field and intends to obtain more cultures for some of the things we couldn't make otherwise. We don't have the tech to engineer these bacteria ourselves, but we can certainly make use of them once we have them."

Allan turned to Erika and said in a low voice, "That's a lot on your shoulders."

"They're broad ones, my dear," she said, "and a good thing, 'cause as he says, there's more yet to be done."

Tom paused for a moment, looking around the room. "I see no one is raising objections to genetically modified organisms, or to my comment about alternative medicine" he said, "it's a big relief to see that that sort of irrationalism hasn't thus far taken root here. As far as solid state technology goes, well, that's a big reach. But lighting is something I don't think we'll want to give up and the efficiency of LEDs argues for putting some effort into producing them, or at least something of similar efficiency. In the meantime, we'll stock up on useful things like that, and it will be quite a few years before the last of the existing LED bulbs gives out on us."

"Anyway, having mentioned five acres per person I think it is time to bring up another concept—that of carrying capacity, and with it the idea of overshoot," said Tom.

"This may be less familiar territory for typical western leftists, who have a tendency to confuse the real physical limits of the planet we are living on with artificial shortages, created by capitalists to keep prices up. The assumption is that if you're talking about limits, you're actually trying to sneak artificial shortages in under cover. We've been told that if we get rid of capitalism and redistribute the wealth more justly, there will be enough to go around for everyone. And if there are real limits, we're nowhere near them yet.

"I think this is pretty unlikely. The best estimates I've read have us already 170% into overshoot. That is, we are consuming 70% more than the biosphere can produce each year, and in the process damaging the biosphere and reducing its carrying capacity. We are also using up non-renewable resources like crazy, without any plan for what to do when they get depleted.

"Carrying capacity is one of those real limits, and in this context, it is simply how many of us a certain area of land can support on an ongoing basis—sustainably, as they say. Of course, this depends on the piece of land—how much it has to give. And on how we choose to live—how much we take from that land. The single most important thing to understand is that in the short term we can take more from the land than is implied by its carrying capacity, like withdrawing the principle of an investment, rather than just living off the interest. When we do so, we degrade the land and actually reduce its carrying capacity. Overshoot is the term used to describe this situation. In the long term overshoot leads to ecological collapse.

"As I said, currently, for the planet as a whole, the human race is in overshoot by about 170%. That's pretty scary, but by being aware of it, and exercising care to stay within the carrying capacity of this chunk of land, I think we can have a decent life here and be generous to the community around us."

On the board, Tom wrote: "Carrying Capacity, Overshoot and Resource Depletion"

At this point Allan had had all he could take. "Just stop right there, Dad," he said, "there's a name for what you are talking about—Eco-Fascism. It's what rich people on the right use to justify austerity and population control or outright genocide for poor countries who they think have too many people. Anyway, carrying capacity is a thoroughly debunked concept. With better technology, the land can support more people. From the sound of this I don't think you're a leftist at all—just a crypto-fascist."

Tom was silent for a moment, his face flushed. "First, you want me to run this place, now you call me a fascist," he said. He paused for another moment, shaking his head, then said, "I am out of here."

He set down his marker on the ledge at the bottom of the white board and stalked out of the room. A moment later, the outside door closed with a bang.

Looking around the room, Allan could see shocked expressions on many faces, though for a start, no one had anything to say.

Then Karen, Allan's mother and Tom's wife, who had been quiet throughout, stood up. "Well, Allan, you caused this problem—I suggest you fix it. Give your dad some time to calm down, and then go find him, apologize and let him explain what he's talking about. See if you can get him to come back. I think you'll find him in the first pole barn. In the meantime, we should get supper on. Anybody want to help?"

Then she left, heading for the kitchen, followed by the handful of people who had been helping with meals for the last few weeks. A buzz of quiet discussion rose throughout the room.

Allan didn't know what to say. Erika looked at him with a quizzical expression on her face. "What the hell was that about?"

"Just the latest episode of a long standing argument," said Allan with a sigh.

"Yeah, well I don't usually like it when your mother gives you orders," Erika said. "But I think you really fucked up this time, and you'd better try what she suggests."

"Oh, I'm gonna," replied Allan. "I just hope I can talk some sense into him."

"Or maybe he can talk some into you," said Erika. "I'm off to the kitchen."

Allan nodded but said nothing more, just sat there with a thoughtful look on his face. It was almost half an hour later when he got up and headed outside to look for his dad.

---

Coming soon, The Porcupine Saga, Part 6: The Sign Above Our Gate

The ideas about group sizes and their functions comes from the Microsoldiarity website. Lots of good ideas there, about how to foster belonging in groups and partnership rather than domination/submission, as well as the group sizes thing.

---

Links to the rest of this series of posts:
The Porcupine Saga

• The Porcupine Saga, Part 1: A Celebration at Porcupine, Allan Harper, July 21, 2040, published February 24, 2023
• The Porcupine Saga, Part 2: When The Lights Went Out, Part 1, Will Harper, Wednesday, July 19, 2028, published April 30, 2023
• The Porcupine Saga, Part 3: When The Lights Went Out, Part 2, Will Harper, Thursday, July 20, 2028, published May 16, 2023
• The Porcupine Saga, Part 4: One Last Lecture, Part 1, Allan Harper, early afternoon, Tuesday, April 9, 2030; published September 25, 2023
• The Porcupine Saga, Part 5, One Last Lecture, Part 2; Allan Harper, late afternoon, Tuesday, April 9, 2030; published October 12, 2023
• The Porcupine Saga, Part 6, The Sign Above Our Gate; Allan Harper, late afternoon, Tuesday, April 9, 2030; published October 12, 2023
• The Porcupine Saga, Part 7, When We Met Jack; Will Harper, late afternoon, Saturday July 21, 2040; Allan Harper, morning, Wednesday, April 10, 2030; published January 16, 2024
• The Porcupine Saga, Part 8, When We Met Jack, Part 2; Allan Harper, midday, Wednesday, April 10, 2030; published April 23, 2024