Showing posts with label Communism. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Communism. Show all posts

Tuesday, 28 May 2024

The Porcupine Saga, Part 9, When We Met Jack, Part 3

Allan Harper, evening, Wednesday, April 10, 2030

During supper Angie had warned the Porcupiners that they needed to have another meeting, and she was at the front of the room by the time Allan took a seat next to Erika. Jack sat down on the other side of Allan.

Angie cleared her throat and the conservations died down. "Well, here we all are again for another Tuesday night meeting, and it's only Wednesday. I suspect this will happen a lot for the first while. Several of the crews have reports to give, and there are decisions to be made. And on that note, I must say that I'm not up to facilitating and scribing at the same time. We need to keep track of decisions reached and action items assigned."

Gesturing with her clipboard and pen, Angie said, "Andrea, could you join me up here?"

"Sure thing, Angie," replied Andrea, and got up to join Angie at the front. Sitting down, she put pen to paper with a flourish and said, "OK, I'm ready, go for it."

"One small point before we go to the crew reports," said Angie. "I notice Jack has joined us. Does anybody have a problem with that?"

No one did. "What about him taking part in the discussion?"

Again, no one objected.

"OK," said Angie, "Jack, I have to tell you that if you get out of line, I'm going to jump on you a little harder than I would on the rest of these folks, since you don't have as much riding on what we decide."

"All I want to do is listen," said Jack.

"That'll work," said Angie, "Now, it's hard to say who should come first, so I'm going to just go with the order in which the crews approached me. Erika, that means the housing crew is up first."

Erica got up and made her way to the front. With a nod to Tom she said, "Well, I got picked to present what we've found and what we suggest doing about it. Most of what we have is questions—I hope we can answer them tonight."

"Go ahead," said Angie.

"Well, we think that first we need to decide what level of accommodations we are going to provide for people," said Erika. "At one extreme we could have people sleeping on mattresses in one of the pole barns, with essentially no privacy, shared washrooms and a shared kitchen and dining room. Our most basic needs would be met and it wouldn't tax our resources very much at all, since most everybody came with a mattress or two and some bedding.

"At the other extreme, we could commit to providing separate houses for everyone. I suspect that would take more resources than we have available."

"Sounds to me like when you say 'resources', you're talking about money, energy, materials and manpower," said Angie. "But I'd say the most basic resource we're considering here is privacy. I suspect we already have something of a consensus on that. Is anyone willing to accept the minimum privacy option?"

This question met with a chorus of noes from everybody except Tom.

He put up his hand and Angie nodded for him to go ahead. "When I started planning out this place, I was thinking of something pretty much like Erica's minimum privacy option, with the addition of privacy screens between each family's area on the floor of the second pole barn. I know it doesn't sound very pleasant, but I'm not sure that we can afford to spend a whole lot on accommodations this spring, when we should be concentrating on self sufficiency. Later on, sure, using our own materials, once we are set up to produce them, but not just yet."

"Can you stand to wait until we decide what level of accommodations we do want to go with, Tom?" asked Angie.

"Sure," said Tom, "better to know exactly what I'm disagreeing with, eh?"

"Exactly," said Angie, "so, given our common cultural background, it's not surprising we only have one person in favour of the minimum privacy option, and that for financial reasons. OK, now let's talk about the other extreme. Does anyone think we all really need separate houses?"

Again there was a chorus of noes, with just a few people who stayed silent. One of them, Nora MacGregor, put up her hand.

"I guess we really don't need separate houses, however small," said Nora, "Maybe just little apartments—I do value my privacy. Especially in the washroom. At the moment, upstairs in this house, six bedroom are sharing one bath. Takes a lot of co-ordination, and some of us older folks can't stand around waiting for long when we need to..."

"To go?" said Angie.

Nora nodded.

Erica, who was still standing at the front next to Angie, cleared her throat and spoke up, "Nora, I may have a solution for you. It's actually part of what I was going to present tonight anyway. I think we should switch over to composting toilets. The septic system here just won't cope with this many people for much longer, and we urgently need to recycle the nutrients in our waste back into the soil.

"I don't know if any of you are familiar with the sawdust toilet, often called a 'Jenkins toilet' after the guy that came up with the idea and tried to popularize it. It's just a wooden box with a bucket inside, a toilet seat on top and a container of sawdust or similar organic material nearby. You deposit your waste and then cover it with sawdust. When the bucket is full, it gets dumped on a compost pile. A year later it has composted down to nice rich black earth ready to be used on our gardens. And any disease organisms have had lots of time to die off.

"Subject to everyone's approval, of course, I think we need to pull out all our existing flush toilets and replace them with Jenkins toilets. And anyone who needs quick access can have a toilet in their bedroom. The smell is minimum, but ventilation can be arranged if it turns out to be a problem."

"Well, that's quite a heap of shit you've dumped in the middle of things here, Erica" said Wilf Janes with a chuckle. "But seriously, there's no doubt in my mind that we do need to do this, and it certainly answers some of Nora's concerns. I'm guessing we could even put a little cubicle in the corner of any bedroom that needs one of these."

"I don't know," said Nora. "It's really kind of a shocking idea."

"I've got a copy of Jenkin's book and a couple of others on the subject in our room upstairs if you want to read up," offered Erica. "And there are some websites you could look at too. Just Google 'humanure'."

Allan's own thoughts on the composting toilet issue were mixed. Like many people in modern western society, "feces" were something he felt should be flushed away behind one and never seen again. Not talked about, and certainly not handled. On the other hand, he'd seen the books Erika was talking about and understood the point about replenishing the soil—turning human waste into a valuable resource rather than something inconvenient to be gotten rid of. He had a hunch that, given a chance, Erika might be able to talk him around.

"I think we need to mull this over for a few days," said Angie. "Andrea, make a note that it should be on the agenda of next Tuesday's meeting. Those with serious doubts should approach Erika and get more information. For now, let's get back to the housing question. So, Erika, do you have a recommendation of where we should fall on the privacy spectrum?"

"Yes, actually," said Erica. "And it is kind of a default option, not much different from what we are doing now. We recommend that couples and single adults get private bedrooms with storage for their personal property. School age kids will share a pair of bunkrooms—4 bunks each, to start—one room for boys, one for girls. Currently, we've get 5 couples, 5 single adults, 2 school age boys and 3 school age girls. There are six bedrooms upstairs in this house and they are occupied by the couples and Jane's girls sharing one room. Some of you are sleeping on couches in the living room and here in the addition. It's a less than ideal situation."

"It is less than ideal," said Jane. "But I'm not sure your solution is an improvement, especially this bunkroom thing. You're talking about taking about taking our kids away from us at age four? What kind of a cult are we running here?"

"No kind at all," said Cindy. "I've got kids and I had as much input into this plan as Erika. The decision as to when to make the move would be up to the parents and the children. And 'away' isn't really the right word for it. The parents' rooms would be in the same building, on the same floor, as the bunkroom their kids would be in. Little different from the average family home."

"That sounds better," said Jane. "But I am guessing kids from different families will be sharing these bunkrooms?

"Initially, as it happens, no," said Cindy, "but eventually, yes."

"So, who's going to be in charge of the kids in the bunk rooms?" asked Jane.

"I don't think we've worked that out yet," said Cindy. "I'd like to say their parents. But I can see cases where disagreements between kids could lead to disagreements among parents. Hmmm... I think that leads to something we haven't addressed as yet, and we really should."

"What's that, Cindy?" asked Angie.

"Well, so far we've all been working really hard to get along," said Erika, "And with some success. But eventually we're going to end up with disagreements that people can't settle among themselves. I though Allan and Tom were pretty close to that yesterday. They sorted it out, but we need to have a mechanism for coping when we can't settle out our differences."

"I think you're talking about having some people trained as mediators," said Angie. "Enough so we can always find a reasonably neutral party to mediate a dispute. Yesterday we talked about facilitator training, which I must admit I haven't got around to arranging yet. But mediator training is similar and could probably be done by the same people. Andrea, make a note for me to get that set up ASAP."

Andrea did so and Angie went on, "Jane, you're OK with this?"

"Yeah," said Jane, "but I'll be keeping a close eye on how it works out."

"Good idea," said Angie. "Erika, where were you?"

"Just about to make a sketch of what we can do with this building," said Erika. "We need a few more bedrooms, the two bunkrooms and at least one more washroom. As we see it, we can have all that by putting in some partitions in the large rooms on the main floor of this house, " said Erika. She turned to the white board and made a quick sketch of the main floor of the house. "The living room could be divided into three rooms, the dining room into two, the kitchen into a bedroom and another bath and there is room in this addition for three bedrooms, two bunkrooms and a bath."

She added the partitions she had just suggested to the diagram. "This gives us 14 bedrooms, and we only need ten, so there is even room for the next few people who arrive. And the materials needed for this shouldn't be very expensive. For now we can still cook in the kitchen and since the weather is warming up, we can eat on the front and back porches."

"Maybe we could hold off on dividing up the dining room until we absolutely need to," said Jim. "That way we can eat inside and give the weather a chance to finish warming up. "

"I think you'll find we want a window in each of those bedrooms," said Don. "So that means we can only get one bedroom out of the living room, at the north end. What's left of the living room would do for a dining room in the short run, especially if we knock out the walls separating it from the hall and entrance way. So partition the dining room and addition first, then the living room and finally the kitchen, once we've got another kitchen set up."

"Actually, Don, that's a pretty good idea," said Erika, and adjusted her sketch to reflect Don's suggestion.

"I think there are a few more things we need to discuss," said Angie, "but first, how does everybody feel about just having rooms instead of houses or apartments?"

Allan was cool with it, but he expected to hear some push back. Surprisingly, everyone agreed with the idea.

"OK. So, at this point, the loose ends are replacing the kitchen, dining and meeting areas" said Angie. "Any ideas, Erika?"

"Yes indeed," said Erika. "Let me just add another sketch and then I'll explain what we are thinking about."

She took a moment to roughly outline the two pole barns, and then went on. "The kitchen here is really too small for this group, much less a significantly larger one. We'd recommend cleaning up both pole barns. Put the kitchen at the north end of the nearest barn, with processing and storage areas for the food we'll be producing, and a buffet counter to divide the kitchen from the dining area. Set up tables next to the kitchen for people to eat at. Maybe a stage for entertainment at the other end of the building, with chairs in front of it for the audience. That would work for these meetings, as well. In the other pole barn we can add more bedrooms as more people arrive, plus bathrooms, and also a 'maker space' with the tools and equipment we'll need to build all those things we aren't going to buy."

"That would seem to just about wrap it up," said Angie. "What do we think people?"

"Just a couple of things I'd like to add," said Karen. "First, if we set up a big kitchen in the pole barn and feed everyone from there, am I still going to get stuck doing all the cooking? I pretty much have so far. I mean, I don't mind cooking, and thanks to those who have helped, but as we get more people it's going to become a big deal. More than I can handle.

"Maybe we could take Tom's 'crew' idea and have several 'cooking crews' rotating through the kitchen or sharing the work some other way. Spread the work around and have more of a variety of food than I can provide. And maybe we can try to scare up some actual professional cooks when we are hunting for new people."

"Sounds good to me, Karen," said Angie. "People?"

This time there was unanimous agreement.

"You had a second point, Karen?" asked Angie.

"I do," answered Karen. "I know that some folks, like my husband Tom here, will want access to the kitchen for a snack now and then. Maybe not the whole kitchen, but at least a small area of it, set up with just enough supplies and equipment for those who feel the need to nosh. Or for people who have missed a meal."

A few chuckled at this but no one disagreed. Allan noticed his parents lean together and have a quick whispered discussion.

"When we first moved in here back in February, I claimed the master bedroom upstairs," said Karen. But we've been feeling more and more guilty about hogging the biggest room. If we get a family with a baby or children too small for the bunkrooms, that would be, of all the rooms we currently have, the best place for them. We think that's likely to happen soon, so we are offering to move to one of the new rooms, so the master bedroom can be readied for that use."

"The other thing is storage for personal property. So far, Tom's had us dump everything in heaps in the pole barns, but it's going to have to come out of there if we follow the current plan. The existing bedrooms have closets, and room for a chest of drawers or two. I'd suggest we add closets when we put those partitions in. There's room in the basement here to put in lockers for what won't fit in the bedrooms. When we start building more rooms out in the pole barn they should be big enough to include storage as well as sleeping space. And talking about storage space for personal property gives me the idea that we should really keep that property to a minimum. Something to be decided when we are actually doing the sorting, I guess."

"Well, what do we think of that, folks?" asked Angie."Speak up if you disagree with any of these ideas."

There seemed to be general agreement. "OK," said Angie. "You got that all down, Andrea?"

Andrea, who'd been writing furiously, stopped. "I think so."

"OK. Now Tom, let's get back to your original objections," said Angie. "Would you be satisfied if we agreed to put together a 'Finance Crew' to take a closer at what we can afford?

"I think we should do that in any case," said Tom. "And as long as I get a spot on that crew, I'll be happy. Perhaps we also need to morph today's Housing Crew into a 'Building Crew' to firm up their plans and cost them out. I still think we may have a bunch of new people show up with little warning— after all we are a 'refuge co-operative'—and we might have to do something like that minimum privacy option on a temporary basis. We should be sure to make whatever preparations are necessary to do that. Mattresses and bedding set aside, privacy screens built and so forth."

"Yeah, I think we can take that on," said Erika.

"Andrea, did you get Tom's suggestions down with all the others?" asked Angie.

"Sure did," said Andrea. "Just remember that Terry and I are still working on the new sign tomorrow and Jack has agreed to help us with getting a couple of big cedar posts out of the bush."

"OK, I think that just means you won't initially be on either the finance or building crew," said Angie. "We still have a couple of crew reports to hear, does anyone besides me think it might be time for a 15 minute break?"

Coming soon, Part 10 of the Porcupine Saga.


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

Maintaining the lists of links that I've been putting at the end of these posts in getting cumbersome, so I have decided to just include a link to the Porcupine section of the Site Map, which features links to all the episodes I've published thus far.

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Tuesday, 16 January 2024

The Porcupine Saga, Part 7, When We Met Jack

Will Harper, late afternoon, Saturday July 21, 2040

"Well," said Will Harper, "I guess he must have talked you into it, 'cause there's the sign."

"Oh, we gave him a hard time, just to remind him that he was no longer the boss," said Allan. "Some thought it was a silly name, but they had nothing better to offer. So it didn't take long to reach a consensus. We became the Porcupine Refuge Co-operative, and a couple of days later the sign went up.

"That evening, before shutting down, we agreed to adopt Dad's suggestions about direct democracy and communism, and to get some training for everyone in consensus decision making, ASAP. We came up with a list of decisions that needed to be made soon, to be investigated by a number of new crews over the next few days, and agreed to meet every Tuesday night after supper, unless events called for a meeting sooner than that. Dad and I agreed to visit our neighbour the next day, with an eye to buying his land and equipment. That's the next story I should tell. Right now, probably, since the tour I've promised you would include some spoilers. It's not as long as the last one, so I think we've still got time."

"OK," said Will, "we don't want to be late for supper, but go for it!"

Allan Harper, morning, Wednesday, April 10, 2030

Allan Harper got out of bed, stretched and rubbed the sleep out of his eyes. Erica had risen earlier, leaving him to sleep. For most of his working life Allan had been a shift worker, and pretty seriously sleep deprived. He'd promised himself that here at Porcupine he'd make a point of getting enough sleep whenever he could, even if it meant being the last one out of bed. He dressed and left their upstairs bedroom, made his way down the stairs and down the hall into the kitchen.

The breakfast rush was over and the big pot on the back of the woodstove contained only the dregs of that morning's oat porridge with dried fruit. It looked like enough for his purposes though, so Allan started spooning porridge into a bowl and soon found there was indeed enough left to make him a very adequate breakfast. He grabbed a jug of milk from the fridge and a cup of coffee from the pot on the stove and, managing to hold onto all three, headed for the dining room. He found his dad, also not an early riser, alone at one of the big tables, reading. Tom was sitting part way down one side of the table and Allan sat down opposite him.

"Morning," said Tom. "You're eating porridge?"

"Good morning to you, too," said Allan. "You remember I didn't like it when I was a kid?"

"Yes, actually," replied Tom.

"Well, here at Porcupine, I'm making a point of trying new things and some old things that I didn't like before," said Allan. "This porridge, for instance. And it is much better than what we had thirty years ago. Which is odd, since Mom made this porridge too. Different texture, different taste."

"Well, that's made with steel cut oats, instead of rolled oats, and it's got an assortment of dried fruit in it. It's also cooked in a pot on the stove rather than microwaved. Which is your mother's idea—I'm the microwave guy," said Tom. "But I suspect your tastes have changed, as well. I know mine have over the years. Anyway, it's a good thing you like it, since oats are easy to grow around here."

"Glad to hear it," said Allan, and spooned up more porridge.

"You ready for a walk?" asked Tom.

"Soon as I finish eating and brush my teeth," said Allan. "We're heading over to see the neighbour?"

"That's what was decided last night," said Tom. "I seem to remember you volunteering...."

"Yeah, but I'm not sure what I'm supposed to contribute to the effort," said Allan, "diplomacy has never been my strong suit."

"In my opinion you're too modest," said Tom. "But maybe you're supposed to watch out for me—I'm getting old."

"Nah, you're hanging in there pretty well... for a guy your age," said Allan with a wink. "So what exactly is the plan, anyway?"

"Plan may be too strong a word. We're going to walk over there," said Tom, "And check out the supposedly closed bridge on the way. When we get there, we'll introduce ourselves, feel him out and play it by ear. The fact that he's still there indicates to me that he doesn't want to leave, but you never know."

"OK," said Allan, "What's everybody else doing while we go for a walk?"

"Again, pretty much what was decided last night," said Tom. "At breakfast earlier this morning people split off into a number of crews. It's a bit of a job to keep track of them all, but I think I've got it straight...

"Oh yeah?" said Allan.

"Yeah," said Tom. "Our legal crew, Mark and Angie, are in the living room with the door closed, looking into getting us registered as a non-profit co-op, and checking how what we want to do here will fit into the local zoning regulations, and what more we need to do to make it fit."

"Our education crew, made up of Nora, Jane and all the school age kids, is in the addition. Again with the door closed, setting up for some home schooling.

"The metal working crew—Jim, Don, Wilf and Miles—are moving their stuff into the machine shed and setting it up ready to use.

"Andrea and Terry have headed into Inverpen to pick up materials for the sign we're going to put over the gate.

"Erika, Cindy and your mom are the housing crew today. They're out measuring the barns and outbuildings, and have already measured in here. All this with an eye to finding accommodations for everyone, including those who'll be joining us as time goes on, and to setting up a central kitchen and dining/meeting hall."

"So, it's really that simple?" said Allan around another mouthful of porridge. "Everybody just gets together and organizes themselves?"

"It seems that it is," replied Tom. "Especially without a bunch of management people with stupid ideas. A good thing, too—if it wasn't that simple, it might be practically impossible. Then someone like me—probably me, in fact—would be stuck trying to do it, and failing. As it is, I don't have to organize one bit of it."

"You sound pretty happy about that," said Allan. "Somebody's going to do it, though, right?"

"I suspect we all have a part to play," said Tom. "It's certainly not done yet. Right away we need a building crew, and we're missing a carpenter, a plumber, an HVAC guy and an electrician who specializes in residential wiring, instead of industrial and power maintenance guys like you and I. Pretty soon we'll need a garden crew, a farm crew, and a forestry and firewood wood crew, at least.

"But again, I don't have to organize finding those people or putting them to work. Anyway, I'm going to get ready for that walk. Meet you on the front porch shortly."

"OK." said Allan. He tucked into his porridge, finishing it in short order and heading up stairs to brush his teeth and put on a pair of hiking boots, his light jacket and a Blue Jays ball cap. He stuck a pair of leather work gloves in one of the jacket's pockets and headed downstairs. Moments later he found his father sitting on the front steps of the old farmhouse, in his khaki safari jacket, with an olive coloured Tilley hat on his head. "You're looking pretty spiffy. Ready to go?"

"Yep," said Tom, "let's head out."

As they crossed the parking lot towards the front gate, Allan noticed several people moving equipment from a trailer into the machine shed just to the east of the barn. Wilf the welder, Don McPherson, Jim MacKenzie and Allan's step-son Miles were all there and seemed to be working together quite effectively. And having fun while they were at it, to judge from the occasional outburst of laughter. The metal crew, hard at it. Allan found it encouraging to watch.

They went out through the front gate and headed east along the shoulder of the Seventh Concession. Allan couldn't help thinking how much the climate had actually changed over the last few years. When he was a kid in Inverpen, even with the moderating influence of Lake Huron, it had been common to have temperatures below freezing for weeks at a time in winter. And lots of snowfall during those times. Some years the lake even froze over. A few miles inland, like here at Porcupine, it was usually at least a few degrees colder. But this past winter there had only been a few days below freezing and what snow fell melted quickly. The grass in the pasture fields was already turning green and the buds on the row of maple trees along the fence line were opening up.

Looking back at the group of buildings at Porcupine, Allan's thoughts turned back to the work that faced them at the co-operative. "You know, if it's just putting a few partitions inside existing buildings, I'll bet the tradesmen we already have could manage it," said Allan. "That sort of carpentry isn't hard. And you did some drywall work when you built our house back in Inverpen, didn't you?"

"It was a bit of a comedy of errors, but I ended up doing all the drywall finishing in that house," Tom replied. "I hired some guys to put the board up, but they did a terrible job, and the prices I was getting to do the finishing were way too steep. So I decided to do it myself. Started in the closets and by the time I was done I was doing a pretty decent job. It's not really hard. I could show you the basics in a day—the main thing is to work in thin coats. And to do a good job of installing the drywall itself so you don't have too much of a mess to hide with the mud. You're right about the carpentry too. I'm sure we could put in some partitions, even do a bit of wiring and plumbing with the guys we've got. But we need to see what exactly the group wants to do first."

"Sounds like we've got another meeting coming after supper tonight to sort that out," said Allan.

"Maybe so. I know what I'd like to do, but I expect I could be talked into whatever the group prefers" said Tom. "Anyway, this is our turn up ahead here."

They turned left and headed north along the side road. Almost immediately, they came to the "Bridge Closed" sign.

"Where's this bridge?" asked Allan, since it wasn't visible from where they stood.

"I've never been further than this," said Tom, "but I suspect it's a ways ahead yet and then down in the ravine."

"OK, lead on," said Allan

The road went downhill a little and then leveled out for half a mile or so. Then it turned a little to the right to head straight down a steeper slope, at the bottom of which was the creek, with a typical township road concrete bridge across it. Allan couldn't see anything wrong with the bridge, but there was another sign: "Closed to vehicular travel".

His dad went down to the edge of the water on the west side of the bridge and had a closer look. "Yeah, there are some cracks down here, alright," he said. "I don't think she'd stand anything very heavy, but we should be OK. One at a time, if you're worried."

"Sure, why don't you go ahead," said Allan. "I'll stand by to either fish you out of the creek or follow across."

"Nothing to that," said Tom as he reached the other side of the bridge and set out up the higher hill to the north.

Allan would have sworn he could feel the bridge shifting as he crossed, but he made it and caught up to Tom by the time they reached the top of the hill. The land to the north of the creek was at a higher level and it was easier to see how the concession was laid out. The creek meandered southwest, crossing the Seventh Concession just before the next side road to the west, with a good growth of bush along both sides of it for most of the way.

"Now, where I grew up, the farms were square, with two rows of five making up a rectangular concession, about eight tenths of a mile wide by not quite two miles long, adding up to a thousand acres. Here the farms are rectangular, a quarter mile wide along the concession roads, by five eights of a mile deep, with two rows of five making up a square, a mile and quarter on a side. A total of a thousand acres again, but a different shape."

"Interesting," said Allan, "I didn't know that was how it worked. So that's why the locals use 'a mile and a quarter' as a unit of distance all the time."

"Yep," said Tom. "Now that's where we are headed." He pointed to a set of buildings about half way along the Ninth Concession toward the next side road to the west.

"Should we cut across the fields?" asked Allan.

"Well, maybe not," answered Tom. "The ground is still wet and the grass and weeds from last year look pretty tangled."

"OK, by the road then," said Allan.

Even going the long way, it was less than half an hour later when they reached the laneway they were aiming for.

"Looks like his truck is here, so he's likely home," said Allan as they turned in and started toward the house.

"Hope so. I'm just wondering which door we should go to," said Tom. "Probably the side one, nearest to where he parks the truck."

Allan followed his dad up the steps onto the porch. Tom pushed the door bell button and they could hear it ringing inside, but it brought no immediate response. After a minute or two, Tom tried again.

A gruff voice responded almost immediately from inside, "Keep your drawers on, I'm coming."

The door opened, revealing a skinny fellow about Tom's age, dressed in a grubby T-shirt, bibbed overalls and bare feet in ratty house slippers. He hadn't shaved in a couple of days, and it looked like he hadn't combed his hair in just about as long. He had an old double barreled shotgun in his hands, fortunately pointed downwards and well away from them. Allan noted with some relief that while the hammers were cocked, the old guy's finger was well clear of the triggers.

"Who're you and what do you want?" he asked gruffly.

"We're your new neighbours to the south and we just wanted to introduce ourselves," said Tom. "I don't think you'll need that gun to keep us in line."

"Don't worry about the gun," he replied, releasing the hammers, breaking it open, removing both shells and putting them in one of the pockets of his overalls. "It's not intended for you. I'm Jack Collins. Been living here for the last 75 years. Who'd you say you were?"

"I'm Tom Harper and this is my son Allan," said Tom. "We moved into the old McConnell place back in the winter, along with some other folks."

"I see," said Jack, offering his hand, which both Tom and Allan shook in turn." If you'd like to come in, I can put some coffee on."

"That'd be great, Jack," said Tom, and they followed him inside.

Allan was wondering what or who the gun had been intended for, and what exactly they'd interrupted. Jack paused for a moment in the hall to lock the shot gun in his gun safe, and then showed them into the kitchen. "Have a seat at the table there while I put the kettle on."

The place was a bit of a mess and smelled like little effort had be spent on cleaning recently. Allan and Tom sat down and watched while Jack puttered away making coffee in a cone and filter setup. "Yeah, this is pretty old fashioned—got it back in '81, a couple of years after we got married. The darned thing lasted longer than my wife. Still works though, and no need for anything fancier. Actually, I used to say the same thing about Mary," he said, "But now that she's gone, it's not so funny."

The kettle came to a boil and Jack poured some water over the coffee in the filter. "I hope you can excuse me for being kinda rude when you came to the door, I'm not having a great day. Now you said your name's Tom Harper. I've been reading a blog for nearly twenty years now, written by a guy of that name. You don't mean to tell me that you're him?"

"Yep, I am him," said Tom.

"And you just show up at my door, out of nowhere, after all this time, " said Jack.

"Kinda like, yeah," said Tom. "I'm as surprised as you—I don't meet many people around here that follow my blog, and I don't believe you've ever commented."

"Nah," said Jack, "I don't usually comment on social media—guess I'm pretty shy. I can see how my interest in your blog might surprise you, most folks around here voting Conservative and all. But I spent 26 years in the union down at the plant and it changed my attitude, I can tell you. I'd guess that I am as much of a leftist as you, and something of a kollapsnik, too. It's nice to meet you—there's not many neighbours left and none with sensible politics."

Jack shook his head, then poured some more water in the filter cone, set the kettle down and gave the liquid in the cone a stir. "Should be ready in a few minutes."

Allan was interested to see his dad somewhat at a loss for words. It had been happening a lot lately. To be fair, this was unexpected—not the way they'd been thinking things would go at all. He perched on the edge of his seat, eager to see what might happen next.

Before Tom could say anything, Jack cleared his throat and spoke, "So what are you folks doing at the McConnell place—setting up some kind of damn commune?"

Allan thought it was a good thing Tom didn't have his coffee yet—he might have choked on it or spilled most of it on the floor.

"Well, uh, actually yes," said Tom after a moment. "Some kind of commune is exactly what we're trying to set up."

"Don't be embarrassed," said Jack. "The way things are going, that's probably a good idea. Provided you can find the right people to join you. I don't have the connections anymore. Is it just you two so far?"

"No, no—there are twenty of us as of yesterday," said Tom.

"Coming along then. You got a name for it?" asked Jack.

"Yep, we just decided that last night," answered Tom. "We're calling it The Porcupine Refuge Co-operative. The reason for the Porcupine part is a bit of a long story. The Refuge Co-operative part is more straight forward, what with all the people—basically refugees—coming back to this area 'cause things are going so badly in the big cities."

"Uh huh," said Jack, turning to grab a trio of mugs from the cupboard. "Looks like the coffee's done."

He poured the fresh brew into the mugs and set them on the table. "What do you take in it?"

"Just something white," said Tom, "whatever you got."

"Same here," said Allan.

"Well, there's milk in the fridge," said Jack. "Let's see what shape it's in." He pulled a carton of whole milk out of the fridge and gave it a sniff. "Seems OK, even if it is past the 'best by' date. Help yourselves."

As Tom and Allan took care of that, Jack said, "well, if we're going to be neighbours, we should get to know each other a bit. What about your family, Tom?"

"Well, my wife is with us at Porcupine, and we have three kids, including this fellow here," said Tom, nodding at Allan. "And counting Allan's step kids, we have 6 grand children. Allan, his wife and her two kids, grown up now, are at Porcupine too."

Jack nodded. "My wife passed a few years ago. We had two kids, both of whom moved to Alberta for work and aren't talking to me anymore. They're hard right wingers now and part of the 'let the eastern bastard freeze in the dark' crowd. So I'm pretty much alone here. Sold the last of the stock last fall and buried my dog a month ago. Lucky the ground wasn't frozen."

"That's too bad, Jack. A fella can get mighty attached to his dog, not speak of his family" said Tom. "You worked at Bruce Power for a while?"

"Well, yeah. Grew up here, went to high school in Inverpen, apprenticed as a carpenter with a local contractor. Worked for him for a few years, then got a job as a scaffolder at the plant. Those guys have scaffold built for anything you can't reach off a 3 foot step ladder. So it's steady work and the pay and benefits are great. The organization is kinda crazy though, so I retired as soon as I had the rule of 82 and farmed here every since. What about you?"

"I grew up on a farm about a hundred miles east of here," said Tom. "After high school I got a job as an apprentice electrician with Ontario Hydro, doing maintenance work in their switchyards. Ended up in the switchyards here at the plant and eventually got promoted to Crew Foreman. Like you, I retired as soon as I could, by which time the company was called Hydro One and was a separate outfit from OPG and Bruce Power. Still a crazy outfit, though maybe not quite as bad as Bruce Power."

Allan couldn't help chuckling silently at these two old guys grousing about how bad the companies they had worked for had been. During his working life he'd seen some privately owned outfits that were damn poorly organized. And even though he had worked mainly in union shops, the contracts he'd worked under had, at best, included only "defined contribution" pensions, not the gold plated "defined benefits" pensions that Ontario Hydro and its successor companies had. The "rule of 82" had allowed Tom and Jack to retire as soon as their age and accumulated years of service added up to 82, with only a slight discount for each year of service under 35. Allan knew his dad had been 51 when he retired, and gladly accepted that discount in order to get out. Allan had been laid off twice and had cashed out his pension both times to spend the small amount that had accumulated on rent and food.

"The last few years I just been farming for fun," said Jack. "Started collecting old farm machinery too. Which may come in handy if you're right about collapse. What have you been doing since you retired from Hydro One?"

"I had a little print shop the last few years before I retired and expanded it after retiring," replied Tom. "Sold it eventually and got into gardening. Like farming, but smaller, you know. I ran the Community Garden in Inverpen for a few years. Quit that when I turned 70.

"We sold our house in Inverpen to my younger brother and rented a place in Port Elgin. I read a lot, science fiction and non-fiction, write for my blog, do some woodworking and a bit of gardening still. And of course, spend time with the grandkids. Lots of fun there, although with gasoline not available sometimes and expensive when it is, we don't get together as much as I'd like."

At this point Allan twigged to what was guiding this conversation. Tom and Jack were both doing the "FORD" thing for making small talk with a new acquaintance—family, occupation, recreation, dreams. And it seemed to be working pretty well, so far. But he doubted that a couple of old working men like Tom and Jack would be keen on discussing something as airy-fairy as "dreams".

"Anything left you're hoping to do?" asked Jack.

"Well, I'm not much of a bucket list guy, but surviving collapse was my plan. Then this depression hit. Not that much of a surprise, really. But before long Allan here and a lot of other people I know were out of work and in a bad spot, things collapsing around them and nowhere to turn. So I started this 'refuge co-operative', actually putting into practice what I'd been talking about for years on my blog. We're just getting started, and it looks like it'll keep me busy for the rest of my life."

So, Allan observed, it's OK as long as they don't actually say the word "dreams".

"That sounds great, Tom," said Jack. "Myself, I'm kinda just sitting around wondering what I should do with the rest of my life. Not that many years left, I'd guess, but a fella would like to think he's doing something worthwhile with the time he'd got left."

"Well, maybe you could help your neighbours a bit," said Tom. "we're fairly clueless about farming and we'd like to get some stock and plant some crops this spring. Hoping to feed ourselves next winter, you know."

"Feeding yourselves would be good," said Jack. "I'd have to look your operation over, but I would guess I could give you some advice and maybe lend you some machinery. It would give me something to keep going for, if nothing else."

"Well, there's no time like the present," said Tom. "There's always a place at our table for one more—why don't you come back to Porcupine with us when we're finished with this coffee. I could show you around the place and introduce you to the rest of us."

"It's not like I had big plans for supper," said Jack. "There's a back way that cuts across the concession to your place. Saves a bit of time. Let me show you the way and you can fill me in on Porcupine while we walk. Just a minute though, I should change into something more presentable before we go."

Allan watched Jack disappear upstairs and Tom call home on his cell phone to warn them there be one more for supper. Then he just had to ask, "Hey Dad, what do you think we walked in on here?"

"I'm not sure, but maybe it's a good thing we arrived when we did," replied Tom.

In a few minutes Jack came downstairs dressed in brown cargo pants, a checked shirt, and work boots (with socks). He was freshly shaved and had combed his hair. All of which made a big improvement. He grabbed a coat and a feed store cap off a hook in the hallway and moments later they headed out the door and towards the laneway that ran down the center of Jack's farm, pointing straight towards Porcupine.

Coming soon, The Porcupine Saga Part 8, When We Met Jack Part 2.


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

Maintaining the lists of links that I've been putting at the end of these posts in getting cumbersome, so I have decided to just include a link to the Porcupine section of the Site Map, which features links to all the episodes I've published thus far.

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Thursday, 12 October 2023

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 acre 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 more 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

Maintaining the lists of links that I've been putting at the end of these posts in getting cumbersome, so I have decided to just include a link to the Porcupine section of the Site Map, which features links to all the episodes I've published thus far.

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Sunday, 24 September 2023

The Porcupine Saga, Part 4, One Last Lecture, Part 1

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

From his seat at the back Allan Harper looked around the big room where they all sat. By his count there were twenty of them now, himself included. Seated on an assortment of couches and chairs they pretty well filled up the addition to the old farm house. He and his dad, Tom Harper, had spent the last six weeks tracking these people down and moving them here, to the back end of Inverpen Township. Now Tom had called them all together.

Allan didn't like meetings, having sat through too many pointless ones at work, but he couldn't see any way out of this one, short of setting fire to the house. That would be pretty counterproductive, though, and would probably only serve to delay the meeting anyway. So he resigned himself to sitting through it, doubting that anything useful or important would come of it.

Tom stood at the far end of the room, in front of a big white board with an erasable marker in his hand.

"For the last few weeks there have been few enough of us that we've just made decisions by talking things over after supper every night," said Tom. "Two problems with that. First, we've added five more people today and more are coming. Soon there will be too many of us for such an informal arrangement. Even now, we can't all sit around one table. We need to formalize our decision making a bit. And two, you folks have been letting me just go ahead and run things. You really don't want to do that in the long run."

This struck Allan as his dad being dumb in an all too familiar way. Allan had no doubt that Tom would try to steer the group towards the sort of consensus decision making process that they had often argued about. He just had to speak up. "Why not Dad?" he asked."We need a leader and you seem to know what you are doing, you've got a plan for where we're going with this. If you get too far out of line, don't worry, we'll let you know."

Most of the people in the room nodded their heads and murmured in agreement. But Allan knew his dad wouldn't go along with it.

"We'll get back to that before I'm done here—it's part of what I want to talk about. And Allan, I know you won't let me forget," replied Tom, "But before I do quit running things—and I guarantee I will—there are a few things I want to say."

Allan shook his head and frowned, but decided to hold off from saying anything more for the moment.

"I haven't made any sort of a secret of what I hope we can do here, but I've mostly talked about it in bits and pieces, and to individuals or couples rather than the whole group. I think I should run through the whole idea from top to bottom in one go, in front of you all at once, just so everyone is on the same page," Tom said. "Hmmm... now that I am faced with the task, I can see why I have been doing it in bits and pieces. Bear with me—it's a little hard to know where to start when trying to sum it all up in one go."

He paused for a moment, drew in a noisy breath, exhaled and then went on, "OK, maybe this will do it. There are three basic things that are behind us all being assembled here today. I sure hope that I've already made those things clear to everyone, but just in case, I guess I should go over them again. If something isn't clear, or you think I'm leaving something out, speak up."

Allan could tell his father thought this would be quick and easy. It seemed likely that he was in for a surprise.

Tom paused for a moment, taking in his audience, then continued, "So, three things."

"One, the collapse of our capitalistic industrial civilization."

"We rely on capitalism to provide us with the necessities of life, and jobs to earn the money it takes to buy them, and it is gradually failing to do either. We are seeing this first in the form of rising unemployment, lower paying and more precarious jobs, and poorer working conditions. And second, in rising prices, supply chain failures and a general decrease in the quality and variety of goods that are available, when and if they are available. Or to put it another way, we are experiencing collapse mainly as an increasing level of poverty, as the number of poor people increases and their level of poverty deepens, while the cost of living goes up. I expect all this will continue to get worse, to the point where a great many people will fall out of the bottom of our system and find themselves homeless and hungry. As many of you know personally, that has already started. Pandemics, climate change and the ongoing effort to sabotage our energy infrastructure are all contributing to the situation as well."

He turned to the white board and wrote, "1. Collapse is happening".

As he turned back to his audience, he said, "Moving on to point two—".

"Hang on a minute there Tom, how can you be sure that this mess isn't going to straighten itself out?" asked Terry Mackenzie. Alan knew him as a retired dental hygienist and amateur potter—a nice old guy who Alan quite liked.

"If you mean 'sure' in an absolute sense, Terry," answered Tom, "then of course I am not that sure. But I am pretty damned sure."

"But the economy has been in trouble before," said Terry, "and it has always recovered."

"Actually, that's part of why I am so sure," said Tom. "I don't believe what's wrong at the moment is a matter of the economy being just temporarily out of whack.

"Capitalism is inherently a cannibalistic system—it eats up the very things it relies on for its continued operation. Over the last few hundred years it has gone from crisis to crisis, running up against one set of limits after another and always finding ways around them. Some people think that this can go on forever. I don't agree.

"These days capitalism has pretty much taken over the whole world, depleted natural resources to the point where they can no longer be exploited profitably, depleted human resources to the point where families and society are breaking down and depleted political resources to the point where governments are having difficulty maintaining the systems that makes capitalism itself possible. It seems that capitalism—'business as usual'—has nowhere left to turn. It has finally hit the wall."

"But surely there is some way to reform capitalism so that can get it back on track," said Mark Mackenzie, Terry's husband, a retired lawyer, an avid gardener and a banjo player who was part of the bluegrass group Alan was putting together.

"Well," said Tom, "the present problems are the result of faults that are inherent to the system. The social democracies of the late twentieth century tried to regulate the excesses of capitalism, and they succeeded to some extent, but not completely. And now they have pretty much all been replaced by populist right wing governments who are controlled by the capitalists, who don't want to be regulated or reformed. So, I don't have much hope for that as an overall solution. On the other hand some communities, like the one we are trying to set up here, may manage to reorganize themselves in revolutionary ways so as to get away from the problems of capitalism."

So far, the questions were the kind that Tom was used to fielding, and while it was clear that Terry had surprised him, it didn't look to Allan like it was really bothering him.

"Tom, I have no trouble with the idea that collapse is going to happen," said Jim MacGregor, a retired machinist who had arrived a week before with a pretty complete machine shop stowed in a trailer behind his pickup truck. "And from your blog I know you think it is going to happen slowly. But why slow? I would have thought that once collapse gets started, it will go hard and fast."

"Jim, I've tossed that one back and forth with many other bloggers and kollapsnik friends over the last decade or two ," replied Tom, "and to a large extent it depends on what you means by slow and fast. Days, weeks, months, years, decades? I believe we started collapsing almost 60 years ago, with the energy shocks caused by OPEC in the earlier 1970s. And I'd say we've got another decade or two at least before the process is complete. I've met people who call that a fast collapse and others that think it's really slow."

"Christ," said Jim, "if that isn't slow, I don't know what would be."

"Still, it's only 7 or 8 decades," said Tom. "Rome took several hundred years to collapse and it was a much smaller entity than our current global civilization. Define the speed of collapse as you will, but there are three things I've observed that are beyond doubt:

"One, collapse proceeds unevenly in a geographical sense. Things fall apart in one area while continuing along as usual in others.

"Two, it proceeds unsteadily in a chronological sense. Things decline quickly for a short period of time, then stay the same or even improve somewhat for a long time after that.

"And three, collapse proceeds unequally in the social or 'class' sense, usually hurting the middle and lower classes far more than the one percent at the top.

"All this makes it hard to see that collapse is really happening and it leads people to put off preparing for it, leaving them even more susceptible to it when it happens to them.

"But speaking in an overall sense, things really do go slower than you might expect. Shaky as our society is, it has a lot of momentum and a big majority of people who are trying to keep it going, with a lot of resources devoted to the job. So when things start to decline rapidly, measures are taken to stop it. Even if they don't succeed and there is a local collapse, things tend to get put back together, at least to some extent.

"And so far, collapse has been confined to small enough areas that help has always been available from outside. Or sometimes, when we in the developed countries don't really care much about the affected area, we just conveniently forget about it. The news cycle is short and it moves on. Ask people in New Orleans or Syria."

Unlike his father (and Jim, evidently) Allan wasn't any sort of "kollapsnik", but he did have a lot of personal experience with the decline his Dad was talking about, and while he wasn't sure about Tom's ideology, pragmatically speaking he was ready to go where Tom lead, especially if the food was good and there was a warm place to sleep.

"What do you think about the sabotage that's been going on the last couple of years?" asked Jim.

"I sympathize with the people who are doing it, whoever they are," said Tom. "We're doing nothing about climate change and other insults to the biosphere. We're making no attempt to conserve non-renewable resources. These folks are frustrated by the lack of action. But we have a great deal invested in fossil fuel infrastructure, much of which needs to be abandoned, and it isn't going to be abandoned as long as it's making money for the people who own it. It would be much easier to abandon if it was in a mess, and making that mess is clearly the aim of the saboteurs.

"This is definitely making things decline faster, and the current depression is part of that. Some would argue that a fast collapse is preferable since it quickly gets rid of the old institutions that are holding us back, and it would bring to a halt the damage that is being done to the biosphere and the remaining stocks of non-renewable resources.

"On the other hand, a slow collapse would kill at lot fewer people since it gives us more time to clue in and start adapting—to develop and implement strategies while the resources supplied by civilization are still available. So, personally, I'd prefer not to speed collapse up any further—coping with it a the current rate is going to be challenging enough."

"I suspect that without that sabotage we wouldn't be here, trying to adapt," said Jim with a chuckle. "Just one more question—why do you think humanity can even hope to survive this at all?"

"Well, that's my next point, actually" said Tom. "Point Two, adaptation is possible."

"I won't deny that extinction is a possibility, especially on an individual level—when our current system quits supporting them, a lot of people will be taken by surprise, and many of them just aren't going to make it" said Tom. "But I also maintain that at least some of us are going to make a successful adaptation. To do that, we need to find an area that is likely to miss the worst of climate change (like here in the Great Lakes basin) and the worst of civil unrest (like here in Southwestern Ontario), and set up in a specific location with the resources needed to allow us to be self sufficient—rainfall, ground water, topsoil, existing forests, junk yards to salvage from and so forth (like this area here in Inverpen township)—so we don't have to rely on a system that is falling apart. Given that none of these things are that hard to do, some of us will likely manage it."

Tom turned to the white board and wrote, "2. Adaptation is possible". And on the next line, "Self-sufficiency and salvage."

"I hear people saying that there is no hope," said Jane Cook, "that it would it be better to enjoy the best of what civilization has left to offer and then go out with a bang."

Jane was a woman in her early forties who had been introduced to Allan as a psychologist and counselor, specializing in PTSD and trauma therapy.

"Well, I suspect that if you really thought that, you wouldn't be here," replied Tom with a smile. "But from one sort of viewpoint it is a fair enough question, I guess."

Allan could tell that his dad didn't really think it was fair at all—this was exactly the kind of thinking that got under Tom's skin.

"And for a while yet, you could probably fiddle while Rome burns, so to speak, if you happen to have the financial resources to support such a lifestyle. But eventually, things are going to get a lot worse. That stage won't be much fun, and it will likely last long enough to be something you'd want to avoid—you'd be going out not with a bang, but a long wimper or perhaps an extended scream. That's why I am here, doing this, instead."

"Well, Tom," Jane said, "I was thinking more along the line that the kind of life we face here might be something to avoid. I've heard people say they'd rather die than go back to the Middle Ages. And death is always an option."

"Well, Jane, a deliberate descent to the Middle Ages is not what I'm planning—this is not a reenactment of Dies the Fire," said Tom. "We'll be aiming to support an early twentieth century level of technology. I will admit that even that will take some getting used to, for people who've been living with the internet for most of their lives."

Alan knew that what his father meant by early twentieth century technology was electricity. As an electrician he expected to play a big role in setting that up, indeed he'd already made a start at it. But he wondered why Jane was giving his dad such a hard time about this.

"And there you bring us to the heart of the problem," said Jane. "These days even many homeless people have a smart phone and can get free wi-fi for an internet fix when they want one. We are all dependent on the internet to some extent, and it's so darned useful that it is hard to argue against it, or imagine doing without."

"Well, that's for us to decide as a group in the weeks to come," said Tom.

"Good, it will be interesting to see what we decide" replied Jane. "And Tom, I hope you know I'm just giving you the gears here. You've asked me to serve as counselor for this group, since we are both expecting the people will have some trouble adapting to our new lifestyle. And I think that is definitely going to be the case. Though actually, looking around this room, I'm pretty impressed—none of us have been checking our phones since we sat down here. So maybe there is hope."

"I think there is, Jane," Tom replied. "And I'm hoping the loss of twenty-first century conveniences will be compensated for by getting away from the trials of capitalism and wage slavery. But I do suspect many of us will find need of your help. And there will be others, yet to arrive, who will have had some harrowing experiences on their way here, and will need your help in coping with that trauma."

"I'm beginning to wonder if I'll be the first person to need my help," said Jane. "It's a lot to take in."

"Indeed it is," said Tom. "Anyway, time to move on to my third point: adaptation is best approached as a communal effort."

"It's clear to me that attaining a significant degree of self-sufficiency is best done as a group effort," said Tom. "Looking around the room, I can see that we already have a set of skills and experiences that no one person or even one couple could ever hope to have. There are many ways to organize a group like this, but regardless of which one we chose, a group it must be."

He turned to the white board, and wrote, " Self-sufficiency—a community effort".

At this point Allan was a little surprised to hear his wife Erica speak up. "Tom, people are hard creatures to get along with. Do you really think putting up with all the interpersonal drama is going to be worth it?"

"I know what you mean, Erica," said Tom, "and I feel the same. Very few of us have had the opportunity to try this sort of a living situation. It's going to be a learning experience, and it will take some effort. But, yes, I think that it will definitely be worth it.

"Still, you are right to be concerned. If you look at the history of intentional communities, what you'll see is a lot of failures. Why? Well, several reasons. The single biggest one is that they were often based on magical thinking, the childish idea that if you want something badly enough, you'll get it. And many of the people involved rejected the sort of counting, measuring, calculating and planning that they connected with business—which was exactly what they were trying to get away from. This meant that they were very poorly organized."

"A bunch of hippies, you mean" said Erika.

"More or less," said Tom with a grin. "But another important factor was that they didn't really need the thing to succeed. They had the option of quitting and going back to regular society when the going got tough. We, on the other hand, really need to make this work.

"Some of you may be aware that I am on record as believing that intentional communities are a bad idea. But that was in a bog post that I wrote about twelve years ago, and a number of things have changed, mainly due to the depression. At that time farm land was extremely expensive, now some of it can be had for back taxes. Most people still had jobs back then, and would have been foolish to leave them, where now unemployment is at a ninety year high and most of us here, if we're not retired, are out of work.

"That puts the idea of an intentional community in a much different light, and that's why I have invited you all here. I am optimistic that we can make this work. We all have similar political leanings—we're flaming commies, to put it bluntly—and that should make it easier to agree on how we're going to organize our community."

A tall, skinny fellow cleared his throat and said, "We just got here today and in case the introductions didn't stick, my name is Wilf Janes—Wilf the Welder, they call me. I am, as you say, a leftist. But I have to wonder, Tom—why you think a little group like this can do any better than the whole of capitalism?"

Allan saw Wilf as a potential friend, but this worried him. He didn't think that Tom had had enough time alone with Wilf to arrange this question, but it sure did lead in the direction he knew his father wanted to go.

"Now we'll never get him stopped, "Allan said quietly to his wife Erika who was sitting next to him.

Tom, who had clearly heard Allan, gave him a cold stare, with one eyebrow raised in question.

Allan put up his hands, palms out, and shook his head—an indication that he didn't want to fight. Not yet, anyway....

"Well... ," Tom went on, "I'm not a fan of capitalism. It's only goal is to make rich people richer. It doesn't have a purpose as far as the rest of us go, except to the extent that it can exploit us in one way or another. And it certainly isn't even trying to fix the problems we're concerned about. As I said a moment ago, it tends to cannibalize the very resources it's dependent on, and because of that it just goes from crisis to crisis. Like the present one. So that sets the bar pretty low."

"Sure," said Wilf, "but I hope you've got more up your sleeve than that."

"Oh, I do," replied Tom. "What I'm thinking of is the power of co-operation and sharing. What is often called mutual aid."

He wrote again on the board: "Mutual Aid, Sharing, Co-operation"

"Doesn't sound like much," said Wilf.

"More than you might think," replied Tom. "We're all used to living in a capitalistic society, where we are urged to compete for artificially limited resources. Mutual aid is scoffed at and its strengths are downplayed. If we all started to help each other, capitalism would lose two of the things it relies on —workers and consumers. We have got some learning to do—none of us have had much practice at this sort of thing. But we shouldn't underestimate its possibilities—a co-operative, communal organization acts as a force multiplier for its members."

He turned to the board and added "—Force Multiplier" to the same line.

"For most of our existence as human beings we lived together in small egalitarian groups. Everyone contributed to the extent of their abilities, and were supported to the extent of their needs and the ability of the community to do so. If that sounds familiar, it's a paraphrase of Marx and a description of primitive communism. This was, and is still, a very effective way of organizing small communities. It allowed our relatively small, slow, and weak species to spread over most of the world and occupy a slot at the top of the food chain."

"Actually, I can accept that," said Wilf. "but people aren't equal, so what's this egalitarian thing?"

"People are all different from one another, and it can be pretty hard to say who is better or worse, given that the situation at hand is always changing," said Tom. "But by equal I mean that each member of this group will have equal rights and privileges and an equal voice in our councils. Also, following that communistic ideal, this won't be strict equality—those who need more will get more, and those who are more capable will give more. And just in case there is any doubt, this is regardless of age, gender, race, sexual preferences or anything else that people can find as an excuse to base a prejudice on."

On the board Tom wrote: "Egalitarian Groups, Primitive Communism—from each... to each..."

Turning back to his audience, Tom said, "Actually, I think we are teetering on the edge of the next major area I want to cover. So maybe this would be a good time for a break and perhaps a stretch and some fresh air. Let's take 15 minutes and when we come back, I'll go over some of the specifics of how I hope this is going to work."

Allan checked the time on his phone and quickly set an alarm for 15 minutes. Standing up, he turned to Erika and said, "let's go outside."

"I see your mom heading for the kitchen," she replied. "I think I should give her a hand."

"OK," said Allan, "See you in a bit."

Coming soon, The Porcupine Sage, Part 5, One Last Lecture, Part 2


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

Maintaining the lists of links that I've been putting at the end of these posts in getting cumbersome, so I have decided to just include a link to the Porcupine section of the Site Map, which features links to all the episodes I've published thus far.

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