Here is the workshop and partial presentation schedule for the upcoming Twin Oaks Communities Conference. The below links are to blog posts on these elements. There is a posted full program (with short descriptions for every workshop are in the newly published program).
There is still time to register for this amazing event. Twin Oaks Community is hosting this event in central Virginia Aug 31st thru Sept 2. There is also great Labor Day (Sept 3) program at Cambia Community, less than one mile from the Twin Oaks Conference site.
The most important part of the Twin Oaks Communities Conference is not the incredible collection of workshops. It is not the rich Open Space offerings. It is not even the Saturday night dance, which is reliably one of the best dances of the year at Twin Oaks.
The most important part is Meet the Communities.
The FECs newest member – East Brook Community Farm 2017
For the first couple of hours of Saturday’s program, each of the communities present send up a representative or three to introduce their community to the whole group for 1 minute. There is a script of questions which representatives can answer, but there is a strong anarchist streak among many of these people and they often freestyle.
Nope – but we are still looking hard for it
Then participants of the event mill around the collection of picnic tables where representatives of the different communities are present longer and more personal presentations. It is like speed dating, except it is better in every way. People can meet people who live in these 40 or 50 different communities and try to figure out if any of them are a good match.
Conversation is the Key – Sky and Victor circa 2016
I have no idea how many people precisely found the community they want to live in at each years Meet the Communities. What i do know is that some of the most important community recruitment each year happens at this conference and this is one of our better tools. If you have a community which is seeking new members, even if you can’t make the entire event, it makes sense to be there Saturday morning.
It might be just the most important place to meet new members for your community or your new home.
This Spring a team of colorful communard builders convened for a secular barn raising. Even though everyone came for different personal reasons, the shared goal was clear, make an old sheep barn more hospitable for commune members. One would assume that a simple, tangible goal would lead to a predictable week, but jumping to that conclusion would skip all the flying fish and cornucopia of magic that happened in-between.
Within the Federation for Egalitarian Communities (F.E.C.) this type of trip is called a LEX, and it’ as culturally far from the norm as East Brook is from any major city. With each turn down another unmarked country road, you are taking another deviation from the cultural norms around work, leadership, and purpose. Officially a LEX, short for Labor Exchange, is a time based currency used between participating members of the F.E.C. through which community members can help their fellow communities, and expect equitable hourly return of help at their own community Yet, the culture of LEX goes far beyond any quantifiable market exchange, and unlocks a culture of radical generosity that questions cultural norms most people take for granted.
While driving down Country Highway 22, the first intersection I had to make a turn at was “Construction projects need clear blueprints in order to be productive.” It seemed obvious that would be a right turn, but I was wrong. On the first day of the build, the travel weary crew was introduced to a small warehouse of materials and an even smaller dilapidated barn, with the general guiding principle being, “The more of these new building materials that we can refurbish the old dilapidated barn with, the closer we will be housing more communards.” One week later 1,000 square feet of insulated flooring was installed, two new walls were built, two doors were installed, and the ceiling was made watertight with a glistening new roof, and yet I didn’t see a single blueprint drawn. Not even a back of the envelope sketch was made. This whole project was a streaming interplay of experimentation, action, teaching and rethinking.
Snowing on the last day of April, normal doesn’t happen at East Brook Farm (from left Nina, Rebecca, Ananda, Rachel, Skylar, Keenan, Becky, Thumbs, Mittens, Denise)
The next crossing on the road was across the train of thinking that says “successful projects need leaders”, which I expected to be a mandatory stopping point, but instead we rolled right passed it. While gaining labor credits through LEX was a periphery benefit to some of the builders, the majority of us came with the intention to gain more confidence in our building skills. Keenan and Nina have decades more building experience than the rest of us, but I’d be surprise if an observer would have been able to discern this. Both of them held space for learning in the egoless way a graceful mentor let’s you flourish in the skills you already have while opening the door for you to lean into your learning edge. It wasn’t that we were leaderless, but more accurately it was that each of us lead ourselves to show up the responsibilities we could fearlessly accomplish.
Step aside patriarchal norms of men leading construction, this is an egalitarian team of communards (from left Becky, Mittens, and Nina)
Now that the previous turns had lead me to unfamiliar territory I knew to turn the other direction when I arrived at the assumption that “efficient productivity needs schedules”. One of the experiences of commune culture that has profoundly changed my life is the experience of abundant food, beauty and friendship without the sweaty palm anxiety of fiscal scarcity putting you a couple paychecks away from being homeless. This separation of work from pure fiscal survival, to making work a voluntary choice to celebrate ones gifts within their chosen commune family, is rarely more alive than at a LEX build. From 6 a.m. till 7:30 p.m. there was a steady stream of workers gracefully picking up the hammer where the last person left off. Slipping away for a nap or meandering down to the stream to get lost in the glistening water where so common that announcing you were taking a break felt unnecessarily formal. We all trusted that everyone was giving as much as they felt called to, and our love for each other dwarfed the importance of renovating a barn, so we skipped planning our day in the morning, and instead celebrated our accomplishments in the evening.
Mandatory dance party initiated by Becky after the last screw of the floor was finished! (from left Becky, Thumbs, Nina, and Keenan)
I knew I was close to my destination when I was faced with the assumption that “hot tubs are expensive indulgences for wealthy people” and I turned the other direction to arrive at East Brook. Communes tend to be wealthy in “resource yards”, sometimes called junk piles by other Americans, which are often stocked with a variety of metal tubs. These bulky containers are as hard to find a use for as they are to get rid of, so they tend to become vernal pools for mosquitoes. However a few of us had experience turning these treasures into fire heated hot tubs, lovingly referred to as Hippy Stew pots. With juvenile enthusiasm we tinkered and toiled until the old barn was outfitted with the makings of a hot tub. Granted it took a few kettles of water boiled in the kitchen to nudge the temperature up to the point of indulgence, but the sensation of winning at life was authentic.
Moving the insulated cow trough into position to be the new Hippy Stew pot! (from left Skylar, Keenan, Thumbs, Ananda, and Grant)
Now that all my assumptions on people’s relationship with work had been inverted, I was hardly surprised when fish began raining from the sky. We were cautiously enjoying a hot afternoon, after a couple days of snow in late April left us suspicious of the order of the seasons, when an epic toil of prehistoric ferocity began in the sky above us. An osprey resolutely clutching a fresh fish catch from the adjacent brook was blindsided by an eagle that mistook the osprey for a food delivery service. The two toiled hundreds of feet above the ground, claws and feathers rolling through the sky in defiance of gravity, until the still squirming fish slid out from the talons and came plummeting towards us. With a crash it landed gasping for water on the metal roof. Maximus and Rachael swiftly collected, gutted and fried it. That night I ate flying fish, and when I tasted it, I realized that to be abundantly wealthy is to be grateful for all that I have already been given.
The bounty of East Brook feed our souls in so many ways!
May is the month when the organizers for the Twin Oaks Communities Conference ask people to think about Labor Day weekend. Specifically, we ask people what types of workshops they might be interested in offering at the Twin Oaks Communities Conference (TOCC). These come in two broad types.
Fixed Time Workshops: This is the collection of 16 (or sometimes 20) workshops which are selected in advance and are all relating to intentional communities. We are exploring different themes and it is likely we will choose a couple of them. If you are interested in presenting on an intentional community related topic we would encourage you to submit this workshop proposal form. The deadline for proposals is May 31st. These workshops happen Saturday, Sept 1st and Sunday morning. Workshop presenters who are selected for these fixed time slots will get their registration fee waived. And if you are coming from NYC metro area (or south of there) you might be able to come on our totally groovy bus.
Open Space Technology Workshop: There are way too many clever and interesting people at the TOCC to not provide a forum for them to demonstrate or propose their own workshop even if it has little or nothing to do with community. The problem (from an organizers perspective) is which ones do you choose? Fortunately, this problem has been well worked by others and there is a democratic, self selecting mechanism called Open Space Technology. These workshops are giving Sunday (Sept 2) midday into the afternoon and typically we do between 10 and 20 workshops ranging in size from 25 participants (like at a urban squatting or polyamory workshop) to just a couple of excited participants (bird watching or Python blockchain programming).
Even if you don’t want to offer any workshop there are three types of people who might want to come to this annual event, which often has over 150 participants and 40 plus communities represented:
You want to find an intentional community to move into
You are starting a community with friends
You live in a community and are looking for new members
If any of these three things is true for you, then you can register for this event here. If you want to see who is already coming and who is interested go to the Facebookevent(35 attending and 215 interested so far (May 1), and we have just started our outreach).
Snow at Twin Oaks (picture by McCune)Keenan and friends building a roof at East Brook Farm on a trip from Twin Oaks (picture from Maximus)Working up on the roof (picture from Maximus)The home of Cotyledon, the new income sharing community in NYC (picture by Raven)Saturnalia being celebrated at Compersia (picture from GPaul)Sign at Cambia (picture by Raven)
East Brook Community Farm is a farm-based intentional community located in the western Catskill Mountains of New York. Founded 2.5 years ago, East Brook runs a successful Community Supported Agriculture (CSA) program, with 15 member families this year.
We all live together in an 1884 seven bedroom farmhouse. We are blessed with plentiful infrastructure, including a large barn and several smaller structures. We farm produce, eggs, and meat while regenerating the health of the land through no-till, permaculture, and holistic management practices. We equally strive to regenerate culture through such practices as nonviolent communication and meditation.
The East Brook and several hillside springs run through our gorgeous 92-acre property. The water in our house, in the garden, and for our animals comes directly from these springs.
In addition to our CSA, we sell our produce at local farmers markets and at our farmstand. We have also planted ~100 fruit and nut trees throughout the property, which will begin to bear over the next few years and expand our offerings.
Sarah founded East Brook Community Farm after a years-long journey of searching for land and fellow community members. She has been connected with the FEC since 2012, when she interned at Living Energy Farm and visited Twin Oaks. She brings over a decade of regenerative farming experience, infectious optimism and drive, and a dedication to personal growth work.
Monica has lived at East Brook for just over 1 year, after years of developing interest in joining a farm-based intentional community. This year, she has managed the chickens and ducks and significantly upped our scything game. She brings passion and skill for animal care, dedication to reduced fossil fuel use, and a keen sense of observation to everything she does, from helping with the cows to innoculating mushroom logs.
Shua (EX-East Wind, EX-Twin Oaks, EX-Cambia) has lived at East Brook since April. He’s been instrumental in the creation of a healthy, heart-centered culture here. He also provides key support in the garden and throughout the farm/community, from handling correspondence to repairing the farm truck.
Rachael has lived at East Brook since March, when she arrived as Garden Intern. She is thrilled to be co-managing the garden in 2018. She brings 3 seasons of farming experience and a passion for building equitable community. Maximus, currently an intern at Cambia, will be joining East Brook in the spring. He is committed to strengthening the FEC network and exploring East Brook’s place within it.
Chickens at Acorn
