Working on Paradise

I was home for a day from camping, and then went to Mendocino to visit a friend. She happens to live in an intentional community. Its still forming. They have a beautiful house. Their first baby chicks ever hatched while we were there. So sweet. It was great and it was nice to feel so comfortable somewhere. I like it. Community. Self-sufficiency. They are eventually planning to be completely self-sufficient, off the grid, ect.

What else is great is that they live walking distance to a town. Boonville. In Mendocino County. I always picture the off-the-grid, intentional communities to be way out in the middle of nowhere for some reason. Off the grid can be in the middle of town! I used to live on the Mendocino Coast, which was amazing. When I spoke to people there, I didn’t feel like an alien like I do in most places. But due to the fact that I can’t weather the gray and fog and I got lonely so far from any urban center, I moved to Oakland, then Petaluma. Now Boonville is a little more populated that the Coast, closer to cities, and the weather is similar to here. And virtually no one wears make-up there. That right there sort of reflects the nature of the town. Fuck Fake, masks, status quo. Be your self. But then the grass is always greener on the other side. I would miss a music scene if I were there for one…

And I am not ready right now to move somewhere like that, or I would inquire on becoming a stakeholder. Right now I need to enjoy this place I just acquired, have some space and quiet for some inner searching and personal development. But it did inspire me to begin seeking likeminded people around me (I hear more and more are coming) and to work on my house, to bring back that feeling of self-sufficiency I was building a year or two ago. As soon as I got home I started working on making my home into a home, as well as writing on a piece I have been working on for a couple months called “Home.” I turned two dead areas of my yard into fertile (I hope) garden beds, planting carrots, beets, broccoli, snow and sugar peas. I moved two giant terra cotta pots to my upstairs porch which is the sunniest place I have to start my patio garden and Ramona planted a large pot of wildflowers in the yard. I started growing some sprouts in a jar today. AND I have begun looking at plans for building a small chicken coop, and asked my neighbors if they would mind chickens. Coincidentally, the neighbor behind my fence just got chickens yesterday. I am just a little nervous to ask the landlord. But I figure if I make the yard from a dead slab of dirt and weeds into a paradise, how can they say no? So I am working on the paradise part.