Productive in the World

went to DELA (Don’t Eat Lunch Alone) in Springfield for the first time. I found out about it through the Pioneer Valley Local First group on Linkedin. If you aren’t familiar with the concept, Don’t Eat Lunch Alone is the idea that lunch can be used as valuable networking time. This group brings together people to discuss ideas relating to business and employment. I found the discussion interesting and I met some people who I think will be helpful with the Sunflower Village Initiative, so I’m glad I went and I’m likely to go again.
I also went to the Forbes Library and wandered around until I realized what I wanted to look at: Treehouse architecture. I found two books, one of which I know I’ve seen before used and desperately want to buy but can’t. So I read that until the library closed. After  picking up my partner from work, we came home and I grabbed a quick dinner of canned soup and grilled cheese, then left again. I went to a volunteer training for Habitat for Humanity. Now I can volunteer on sites for them, not just stuff envelopes.  I’m really excited about the non-profit skills I’m going to learn from them, in addition to house-building skills.

Organization

While I was a student, I had opportunities to gather information about local organizations and businesses with goals and values similar to the Sunflower Village Initiatives. However, as I was focused on my education and unable to devote the time to them, I filed them away to be researched later. This past week, I cleaned out my files. I began creating a database of these entities, which in keeping with what I have been learning from Katie G., I am terming Allies. I plan on researching these Allies to see how our values align and what kinds of relationships we can build as SVI grows.
I have long struggled with being specific enough about how the Sunflower Village Initiative will work. So one of the other major things I am working on is thoroughly describing the Initiative: how it will work, what programs it will engage in, who it is for, and why it is needed. I am also brainstorming ideas for making more effective use of Board Members capacities and time as well as for involving individuals who want to be volunteers or members of the Initiative. As this becomes more coherent, I am likely to share some of it here to disseminate the ideas and to receive critiques. Look for more soon!

New Perspectives: May 19, 2011

I’m back from India. You can read about some of the things I did there at my other blog, http://surajmukhiya.wordpress.com. There is a lot more to say about what I saw and experienced and learned while on my study abroad program. A lot of things gave me new thoughts and ideas about the Sunflower Village Initiative, including the physical layout and economic organization of villages, the importance of common lands, and, surprisingly, a lot of new thoughts about the expression of class amongst Americans.
While I was cavorting about Rajasthan, board member Katie G took the Grassroots Community Development at the University of Massachusetts Amherst. She seems to have learned a lot about Solidarity and community and changing things on a community level. Discussing other things that have happened while we’ve been apart, we realize that we really need a day or so to get on the same page about SVI again. We also agree that in some ways we need to start from the beginning again and lay a deeper foundation. Hopefully that will happen in the next week or so, and then we can take some fresh steps forward.

Landlessness and wage-bonds

Long week... already, catching up from being sick
not just from school, but that, yes, always that, doing what I can, and communicating like crazy, to profs, TAs, SGI people.
Still not caught up with myself. Got to do some dishes after finishing homework tonight, and yeah, I said *got* to and meant it. Thank goodness Daniel did the laundry. We're both running hard and doing all we can, and our lives are becoming ever more gargantuan.

Lots of things I want to write about - my connect/disconnect to Marx, marxism, labor. My passion for Upton Sinclair. Thinking about economy and organization of labor. Reconsidering my approaches.

There are two bandages that hold us in thrall, physically in this society.

(I know there are others, many others, in spiritual, intellectual, other areas, I know, know too that they are all interconnected, but I have a PoinT here... that is to say, there are two bondages)

There are two bondages: Being, still, after milennia, the landless peasantry, the land ripped away from us (ill-ly)legally....( we, the working class, the producers, the makers of vitals or the chain of people who get them from the makers to You, consumer.) In short: we rent, we do not own our castles, our abodes where we may at last have our Say. I rent, so I do not define my own space, except on the surface, my trappings, my coverings, things I bring every place I live to remind-pretend that this is not someone else's. I doubt again that I will grow corn next spring or summer, and who knows if/when ever I'll get that cat door. Because it is not something I really have a say over. So, the bondage that I rent, that I am landless, like every lowest class. And there abounds the myth that there is not class in *America. So, the idea, the revolutionistic desire that once again, we should have an abode, for us, not for the profit of another, but a place to finally hang our hat at the end of the day and not worry whether the second bondage threatens us in the security of our sleep.

The second bondage: to work filling the pockets of others to bursting, and not being able to tell whether we fill ours just enough to eat, to sedate ourselves a little into acceptance, or whether we are actually benefiting from the arrangement, making progress towards freedom from the first bondage or following dreams or saving the world or merely having a fulfilling occupation. Yes, that second bondage is, (and I *will* be so bold as to thank Marx for this line) the slavery of wage.... that endless work that we too often cannot tell what happens to, who it benefits, if it is what we are told it is. Is this the best we have to offer? Too many inconsistencies, and always this cycle of how much do we risk to speak up to appease our angry sense of justice , how much do we live with in order that we may attempt to someway, somehow, accomplish our nobler ends? The means ARE connected, invariably to the ends. There must be better means, or our ends are sure to haunt us as tainted. To which solution, then do I dare?

I don't know yet... again, more research, more dialogue, more experimentation and self-delving.

Again, and more. A few snippets of new connections, fresh determination, I leave here tonight. There is certainly more whirling around, but tomorrow has, again, many demands.