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!

My first attempt to represent this is pretty light in terms of the individuals it encompasses and some of the links and visualisations have been simplified more than I would like, but it’s the genesis for constructing a family-tree-of-choice.  That said, while the number of individuals is not large, the vast majority of you spiral out from the people in the people in the drawing, or from the social hubs there.  (At some point I may have the time and ambition to construct a much bigger and more detailed version, but my relationships with others are something of a moving target since they seem to be stuck in a state of expansion.)

The blue boxes are active social hubs filled with people I care about.  The green boxes are individuals who have connected me to hubs, tending to result in me meeting a whole lot of new people at once.  And the purple boxes are my big damn hero connectors who have individually linked me to three or more other individuals in the chart.

I discovered a few interesting things from this exercise.   Firstly, all of my most active social networks and best loved people spin out from beginning architecture school in 1997.   Secondly,  Siobhan and Sky are unusual in having connected me to both individuals and social hubs.  Thirdly, my brother Dave is a unique and special snowflake (sorry Dave, you are not a unique and special snowflake; you know what you are) and is the only person here that doesn’t have links in or out, although he knows many of the people in the picture.

Most amusingly though, is that The Man With The Hashtag is sitting in equal first place when it comes to connecting me to individuals.  In the face of this evidence, I must humbly concede that he has indirectly been responsible for so much love, support and happiness in my life.  Bless.

Being born with a factory for making more of me, the question of children is one I’ve been considering for many years. At twenty, I was confident that I didn’t want to have children in the coming few years. At twenty-five, I was leaning towards the idea that I might never want children. And now, in my thirties, I feel comfortable that my path in life doesn’t involve motherhood.

I find the commonly-held expectation that one will justify the reasons for choosing not to have children to be counter-intuitive when it comes to my own decision-making process, and it is far more consistent with my own values to ask the question, ‘What are my reasons for choosing to have a child?’ And the answer to that, increasingly, has been ‘I don’t have any reasons. Not one single, persuasive reason for me to choose to bring a child into the world. I don’t even want to.’  And you know what? After a decade of asking ‘Why wouldn’t I?’ I’ve personally found it so much clearer and more meaningful to ask ‘Why would I?’ My default is different from many people’s, and that just took a little time to figure out.

After some thought and research, much contemplation of the modding of biology and an excellent conversation last month with one of the doctors at Family Planning WA, I’ve learned that surgery for tubal ligation is no longer the only option and that new fallopian implant methods such as Adiana and Essure have roughly comparable failure rates. (The doctor also made the point that IVF is available to patients who change their mind later in life; I sincerely hope it will never come to that, but it’s good information to have nonetheless.)

There are only a few gynecologists in my city who carry out the newer procedures, and those that do tend to have long waiting lists.  In fact, when I called with my referral the first appointment available to me was in mid-September. Then yesterday, I received a phone call to say that there had been a cancellation and I was welcome come in the following morning. After a moment of anxiety about the sudden change in timing, I said I’d be very happy to take the appointment. (My appreciation to the woman who cancelled; perhaps you’re still thinking it over, or have changed your mind. Maybe you’re even pregnant now. Whoever you are, I hope that your choices are happy and fulfilling ones .)

And so today I went to the appointment, had another excellent conversation with the gynecologist, and the upshot is that I’m scheduled to undergo day-surgery next month. Being an anxious person at the best of times, I did wonder how I’d feel after the decision was made. It turns out that I feel calm, contented and right, which is the best possible outcome.

Much gratitude goes out to the people I’ve told privately. I’ve heard some war stories from friends who have chosen to go down the same path, and the support, rationality and non-judgmental conversations I’ve enjoyed have made this a far happier and less frustrating choice than it might otherwise have been. And much love to my small friends, relatives and godchildren; so many bright and clever and compassionate small people, whom I’m hopeful will grow into bright and clever and compassionate big people. You will always be a part of my journey, and the time I spend sharing, learning and talking with you will be one of my many gifts to the future.

Now to add some levity to this Thoughtful and Serious Business, let’s all sit back and enjoy a few relevant xkcd comics. (xkcd: Always related.)

Advanced Technology
Babies
Natural Parenting

I’m still in the middle of the great brain experiment.   I’m going to persist with 150mg of Sertraline a day for the next month and reassess at the end of it. Right now, it’s making me dopey as all hell, and isn’t doing much for the pre-menstrual merry-go-round of general anxiety, social anxiety and depression. However, aside from the PMDD phase, it seems to be a step in the right direction. (I actually typed ‘depression’ instead of ‘direction’ there and fixed it on an edit – what are you trying to tell me, brain?)

Right now, I’m feeling exhausted and negative about the whole thing and am at the point where in the past I’ve tended to say ‘I can’t do this anymore’ and give up, but I intend to push through this time and see if it’s possible to find an optimal treatment.

The Christmas

Christmas…there’s something I’ve been wanting to do for years, but have been worried about coming across as terribly self-righteous or critical of other people’s choices, which isn’t my intention at all. It’s this: I am happy to announce that I am not sending physical cards out again this year. And I am not going on the Annual Shopping Ordeal (I hate shopping) to find Arbitrary Stuff to give to people as Meaningful Presents.

I have ordered my parents some prints of my art which I will frame for them. Portable Dave, you can have a voucher to spend on whatever you will most use and enjoy – let me know what that might be. Everyone else: I will bake, give away my art and craft, take cuttings from my garden, maybe put them in little terrarium jars to give away, and distribute the abundance of eggs from my chickens. I will cook for you, draw for you, love you and hug you. (Some of these things may be delivered a little late, as I know quite a lot of people.) I may donate a goat or some ducks to charity in your honour. If you have any special requests, let me know, as I do like to give things that are wanted. But I will not angst about buying you plastic things and wrapping them in shiny paper for you to throw away.

The Tame Chicken

The chicken called Boomer is super-tame now and allows me to pick her up.  All of my chicken-related dreams have come true.

The Seeing of You

There will be another Open House Day at my place in the near future, so long as I don’t go completely crazy or something. Oh wait.

Right now I’m doing some work that involves re-running a model through twenty or so different scenarios, and each run takes around a minute, so I have Notepad up and am using the runtime to write. It feels like a luxury to have some time to start thinking about having a page to fill with words.

I’ve been trying to manage the number of hours I’ve been spending in the office, but even when I’ve been able do that, the intensity of the last month has been something to behold. There’s not much I’m able to say about it in a public forum, but it involves a lot more responsibility and a whole bunch of time-critical work. I’m hopeful October will see a promotion, as I feel there’s a significant mismatch between the level I’m on and the work I’m doing.

Over the past month, the last module of my professional qualification has started up, so I’m studying and involved in a bunch of other things too. I know it’s something I come back to time after time here, but the struggle to manage commitments seems to be something of an ongoing theme in my life. I made a mind-map while I was having lunch yesterday, and even though many things spawned sub-commitments and began to ooze from the edges of the A4 page, it feels better to have the majority of it laid out.

Out of everything I’m doing at the moment, passing the last module of my Grad Dip CA is far and away the most significant one when it comes to my long term well-being. In part, this is because repeating will be a very expensive exercise, but more because the timing of finishing the course directly relates to when I’ll be free to leave Large Accounting Firm without having to repay my sizable study debt. ‘Freedom, horrible freedom!’ as they say. (‘I’m the Queen!’ ‘No you’re not!’)

What else? Oh yes, the week just gone has been a shocker when it’s come to mental health – by far the worst in recent times. While horrible, the upside of this has been that I’ve managed to get through it without messing up anything significant, which is quite exciting – my ability to manage depressive episodes has really lifted in the past couple of years, and this is a topic I’d like to write more on at a later date.

Other than that…well. I’ve seen The Mountain Goats, Jeff Martin and Henry Rollins recently. Rollins was doing his Frequent Flyer spoken word tour, and I don’t think I have anything near the articulacy to express how moving and inspiring I found it. The man is a spectacularly interesting human being, and I find much of his discussion around depression, adventure, happiness and human experience to be almost painfully resonant. (I’m selfishly frustrated that he’s famous, because if he weren’t it would be easier to say ‘hey mate, come have a drink with me and we’ll talk about life the universe and everthing’.)

Musicwise, I’ve been obsessing over a few things, mostly relating to recent gigs. Jeff Martin’s Live in Dublin album is excellent, and I would strongly suggest getting it from iTunes if you haven’t already. portabledave has also put me onto The Tallest Man On Earth aka Kristian Mattson, a profoundly Dylan-esque folk muso from Denmark whose new album, The Wild Hunt, I’ve had on repeat. And then there’s the latest Mountain Goats album, The Life of the World to Come, which has this song about the thylacine, the dodo and the golden toad which just about moves me to tears every time, because (like most Australians?) I’m well aware of the heartbreaking footage they’re referring to in the first verse:

And finally, a few links that I’ve stumbled across and appreciated in recent weeks:

This year, none of my half-drafted text posts have yet come to anything, but I’ll have you know that they’re sitting there in the dusty attic of a hard drive, waiting to be unleashed.

In the meantime, I’ve posted some more birdwatching photos to Flickr, including the Welcome Swallows pictured above.  Wings are exciting; I’m having fun times (and sometimes frustrating times) learning to photograph wings.

My excuse for not having written anything of substance – one of my excuses, anyway – is that I’m buried not only under unpleasant work (Large Accounting Firm has jumped the shark, it really has) but under an avalanche of side projects.

Some of the side projects include doing a triathlon, getting my diving certification, building a barrel garden, harvesting the local laneway/vergeside fruit, looking for a new job, soaking up as much of the summer cricket as possible, and two secret things.  One secret thing is is about tentacles, the other is about maps.

Somehow I think spending time at the beach needs to be on the projects list, but isn’t. It strikes me that this is a terrible oversight.

The wonders of gadgetry aside, I’m feeling optimistic about 2010. It’s an arbitrary flick of the page, certainly, but there was something auspicious about waking up on New Year’s Day with not a trace of my resident anxiety and depression, to spend the day feeling blissfully calm and loved.

Having decided that good years come to those who help themselves, I’ve got myself a referral to a good psychiatrist for a review of my diagnosis and medication. (It’s been over twelve years since I’ve had a psych, so I’m thinking it’s about time.) And I’ve spent my holiday leave doing quite a number of fulfilling things, including:

repeatedly going to the cricket, courtesy of alibaster

Here endeth today’s random holiday round-up.