Was this a headline on a blog or news site? Was it a nasty remark thrown at me from by a cashier in reference to my “Plastic Bags Blow” t-shirt? None of the above…it was a playful thing my husband said to me this past weekend. Admittedly my husband is not the greenest man on the planet but he is making great strides in that direction and mostly because he loves me like crazy and he sees that it is important to me. So now he is quick to send me links about sustainable news and events and tell me what green companies he thinks we should invest in. He also brought home SLS free toothpaste the other day and he bought the kids some wooden toys…showing he is starting to embrace more natural products. And bless him….when he has to sit through yet another documentary about global warming or listen to my latest rant about greedy corporations destroying our planet he doesn’t complain. So why would he say the above to me????
Well it appears I have found his limit. When I told him of my plan to invest a million dollars into starting an eco-village he had to put his foot down. Okay…in actuality the million dollars was hypothetical…it was my answer to ProBlogger’s birthday bash question about what you would do with a million dollars…but when I told my husband of my “plan” he said he was extremely NOT interested in founding or even living in an eco village.
We talked at length about it because this kind of bothered me as I would LOVE to live in an eco village/co-housing community and have been considering going to planning meetings for one such community being started in southern Ohio. But as I dug deeper into why my husband has strong negative feelings about the concept I realized he is imagining a bunch of earth children dancing around a fire, holding hands, praying and singing to the birds. He is thinking that he would have no privacy and no freedom to enjoy anything that might be considered less than green.
So now I am doing my research to “sell” him on it. Basically eco villages are “urban or rural communities of people, who strive to integrate a supportive social environment with a low-impact way of life. To achieve this, they integrate various aspects of ecological design, permaculture, ecological building, green production, alternative energy, community building practices, and much more.” This definition was taken from The Global Ecovillage Network.
Many times it means a group of people with like values come together and combine resources to buy a plot of land and build earth friendly homes (usually attached), gardens, conservation areas, and a community building where they enjoy meals and activities together. These communities could consist of a half dozen families or a hundred but they share the same desire to live in harmony with people and planet. They build energy efficient homes, use alternative power when they can, share many possessions like cars, garden as a group and even run CSAs and farmer’s markets together. They work together to maintain their homes and land and they really help each other in any way they can.
One of the most well known examples is the Eco Village at Ithaca. You can read a wonderful book about this community and get a real feel for this type of living. I reviewed the book here and I continue to admire what they have accomplished….if I could move there I would…in a heartbeat! Of course IF my husband would agree. :)
I just love the idea of forming a real tribe of people with the same values. It would be like picking your extended family.
So what about you? Would you? Could you? Won’t you be my neighbor?
I’ve been thinking about and interested in the Eco-Village idea myself, but in some ways I’m less interested in ‘intentional-communities.’ For me the difference lies in the fact that an eco-village (basically the same as an intentional community) is a private community with privately owned land. It’s like it’s own version of an apartment complex or suburban neighborhood, only ‘green.’ So I’ve recently begun doing some research into the idea of ‘Eco-Municipalities’. The distinction here is that the community is public and open to new members without a pass. It’s basically a town charter that gives weight to environmental and social issues but retains our traditional autonomy within community.
This is important for me because it has a more realistic potential for change then splitting the world up into insular groups. Like I said, I’m just starting the research, but you can check out some links here…http://grafter.typepad.com/blog/2007/10/eco-municipalit.html
Maybe this is an idea that your husband can get more on board with.
I’ve heard of such communities — documentaries about modern communes in Scandanavia, for example. There are definitely advantages in terms of economy of scale. You could run hot & cold water off a central plant, and save costs. You could centralize Internet & TV service, run fiber to the homes, etc since there are no utility easement issues to deal with. A central kitchen could offer loads of powerful, efficient appliances, while your own kitchen could be kept small and simple, to free up space for other purposes. And common outdoor spaces could create safe, car-free places for children to play.
If someone could answer the question, “how do you pay for all this stuff?”, then I think it would work. But I don’t know that answer.
I actually live in a cohousing community in Colorado. Let me tell you that it is AWESOME. I can’t go into all the things that make it wonderful in a short comment, but I am planning on blogging more about my community soon. My community is green, but it certainly isn’t hardcore. We recycle, compost, keep an organic garden, limit our use of chemicals, etc. Pretty standard stuff. I feel the best environmental impact is our sharing of common space. And you don’t have to be hardcore to live here. My husband sounds a lot like your husband.
The best part of living in cohousing is the sense of community and the support and connections you feel towards your neighbors. Something I think the world needs more of to become more environmentally aware. Less “me” thinking.
I totally would be into this if it happened in my community, our income is pretty much tied up in being here, but it sounds so wonderful.
Very curious about that. My only fear is that I may think that represents the world out there and stop “preaching” and annoying others!
Same with Kristen, my husband is much like yours. He jokingly calls me kook and begrudgingly (sometimes willingly) does green things. He is also incredibly anal, so when he gets on a green activity, he goes all out. For instance, he is big on recycling, so he gets on my case if I forget to recycle a grocery store recipe. Yeah, that anal.
I have been in love with the idea of an eco-village for a while myself. and there is one coming up down the road from me (Pringle Park Community) that seemed like a dream. smaller streets to encourage walking, a ‘town center’ with a community greenhouse, parks, 100% sustainable houses… beautiful *sniff* … but what has completely turned me off was when i heard each -small- home was almost 400,000 (in Salem an average home is about 200,000 or less). I am disappointed that this can’t be a lifestyle that incorporates all income levels. I stay home with the kids- we’re a one income home on purpose… This kind of living should be more economical- otherwise we won’t even be around much to enjoy any of the ‘community’ – we’ll all be working too hard to just afford it.
Have a look at http://www.cohousing.org/ for the ~100 cohousing places around USA. I have been touring ones on the east coast, heading over to look at the west coast ones next week. None of the ones I have seen even come close to “earth children dancing around a fire, holding hands, …” They have ranged from friendly neighborhoods where people know each other to tight communities that spend a lot of time with each other socially. They were all balanced/realistic in terms of the amount of green features, none of them were more than 10% above market price for the locations they were in. I myself was reluctant to go to an intro meeting, but found that my preconceptions were way off. Happy discoveries.