flyingblogspot.com (tales from urban dilettantia)

Readers, there are Happenings baking. Happenings of the nature of a social experiment, a home, a community, an idea, a crazywonderful leap into the unknown.

Cary and I have been considering for some time the theoretical problem of introverted polyamorous beings trying to find a way to invent a household that accomodates shared space, creative space, private space and seclusion, sovereignty, sharing of labour, and room for lovers and friends and family. We’re also really interested in concepts of community and family-of-choice, and how to build these things into our lives, and playing with different models of togetherness.

Somehow, after two weeks of looking at houses ‘as if’ and ‘to get an idea what’s possible’ theory tumbled unexpectedly into launching a social experiment of fabulous proportions.

Today our unconditional approval of finance came through from the bank. We have impulsively purchased a townhouse a mere 750m from Flyingblogspot Cottage as joint investors in this madness. We’re about to move into a household that happens to be split into two separate buildings. We’ve bought it as joint investors rather than as partners in a relationship, so if our crazywonderful experiment yields a result of ‘this does not work’, it will be easy and financially sensible to rent it out as an investment.

It’s a great fit for our needs – large for a townhouse in the area, with spaces for bikes and vehicles, a garage for a workshop and outdoor spaces to work in, space for a cat run, a big bright area upstairs with light that will be just perfect for art and sewing and electronics. The cottage appears to be destined to be library and gamerspace, the townhouse (yet to be named) to be artspace and makerspace.

The second time we went to view the house we took Grahame and Nathalie with us – two people who already have keys to Flyingblogspot Cottage and a standing invitation to treat it as home as required. They were excited too, and helpfully tried to balance our judgment by providing a list of pros and cons. Unfortunately, they were not successful in finding any significant cons, and so were forced to invent a claim that they’d heard that ‘this type of carpet causes Face Death’. Bravely, we decided we were willing to risk Face Death.

Then, suddenly and unrelatedly, Sky and Jason mentioned that they were considering moving into a new house near Hyde Park in the near future and we suggested that they might like to be a part of our extended enclave-based household too, should this happen. It turned out that they liked this very much. In spite of the risk of Face Death.

A few weeks later, we had breakfast with the lovely Alexa who lives around the corner, and I quietly told her about her about the plans and how dearly we would welcome her if she were interested. And then I had a moment of ‘argh, too many people!’ until I realised that there were not too many people, but just the right number of people. (Although I am not above trying to lure Nathalie and Grahame down to Highgate, should the opportunity arise. They are special and do not add to the critical mass of people.)

I’ve been trawling the web for some time to find other mad, land-owning-capitalist-pig hippie communists who’ve tried something like this and have had very little luck in finding precedents. And so, shaping the idea of a community of islands is something of a black hole where benefits and problems are not necessarily forseeable. But it’s thrilling too, in the sense that we are inventing something new that we can shape for ourselves. I keep coming up with a multitude of tiny ideas and asking ‘what if…?’

What if my chickens and garden could help feed us all? What if someone slow-cooks a big pot of food and everyone who wants dinner can wander over to eat together? What if, when there are leftovers that we may not eat ourselves, we can send the other houses a message and say to come and pick them up if they will be eaten? What if my garden becomes a our community garden? What if we order those big mixed boxes of fruit and vegetables and share them? What if we put up a pole and share our an internet connection? What if we turn Hyde Park into our weekend breakfast back yard? So many ideas; what if, what if, what if!

However, in my nervous, over-stimulated excitement over this project, I have neglected to mention that there’s a practical (and by ‘practical’ read ‘begging’) side too. Settlement will take place on the 12th of February. In the meantime, Cary is currently living in a big old rental place in Bayswater and has been there for a decade, and is not an enthusiastic declutterer. (An understatement – in fact he is more of a compulsive this-will-be-useful-er.) Somehow, over the weekends and evenings between now and February, we will need to cull, pack and move a house filled with a decade of collected items and I think we will be in desparate need of help. And so, I thought I’d post the list of things we need, in the hope that anyone who is supportive of our experiment might be able to offer some time and love.

Packing, wrapping and taping

Putting together an ‘everything’s free’ garage sale

Supportive company – bring your study, marking, whatever

Clapping

Lifting things

Supportive nods when Cary is making difficult decluttering decisions

Putting things into other things (hur hur hur)

Hugging

Supportive lunch/coffee delivering to lift spirits

Thing-taking-aparting

Freecycling and finding new homes for things

Slapping whenever we get lost in details or culling angst

Planning logistics and problem solving

Cat reassuring (do not wear kitty ears; Zeus hates and fears that)

Cleaning up

Removing plants we want to keep from the garden

Eleventy million other things I’ve probably forgotten

It’s a big job that we’ll need to tackle incrementally rather than an army-for-a-day job. Beers, food, hugs, eternal devotion and the like will naturally be provided to anyone who turns up at any time; we desparately need our friends and family to help us make our experiment happen!