 |
Farm Fresh, February 2025In this Issue:
|
"An Ecovillage should integrate human activities harmlessly into the natural world in a way that is supportive of healthy human development." This is my focus for Part 2, Is The Farm Community an Ecovillage?
It goes without saying that many of us are still trying to come to terms with the changes going on in the U.S. right now.
This is a good time to remember the wisdom of the Zen teaching, “Till the square inch.”
As we would tend a garden, so we begin by focusing on the things in our immediate sphere that we can control, the square inch. Bring your attention to yourself, your state of mind, your health. Finding that peace in the core of your being
Move out to the square foot by taking care of those around you, your family, your friends. Polish those connections. They are what will sustain you through these difficult times.
Go a step further to the square yard, your community. Find those in your wider circle who share your values and become like links in a chain, stronger together.
This is how we will hold fast, to remain an example of the greater good. Remember the words of Martin Luther King, "The arc of the moral universe is long, but it bends towards justice.”
Douglas
P.S How does this look to you? I was going through multiple versions to get the fonts all the same size. I forwarded a preview to a friend that saw double images. Let me know how it looks for you. Thanks! Douglas
P.S How does this look to you? I was going through multiple versions to get the fonts all the same size. I forwarded a preview to a friend that saw double images. Let me know how it looks for you. Thanks! Douglas
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Nature and the Land
Big Swan Creek
Nature and the Land
Big Swan Creek
"An Ecovillage should integrate human activities harmlessly into the natural world..."
By what some call a miracle, in 1971 a bunch of hippies acquired 1000 acres for only $70 an acre and just a few years later added another 750, for a total of 1750 acres.
With a population of 225 people, this alone gives the residents of The Farm a very small carbon footprint. But it doesn’t stop there.
Swan Conservation Trust, a nonprofit land trust founded by members of The Farm, has purchased and established the 1475 acre Big Swan Headwaters Preserve that borders the community on two sides. In addition, Highland Woods, a land cooperative owned by a consortium of Farm members, former members, and friends represents another 650 acres.
In total, there are over 4000 contiguous (and more non-contiguous) acres under control and managed by like-minded people who value the beauty and sacred essence of the land and nature.
Over 1000 acres of The Farm's land is kept completely wild with no development, used primarily by residents for hiking. 
All residential areas are merged with the hardwood forests along the ridge tops, leaving forested valleys separating neighborhoods undisturbed.
"An Ecovillage should integrate human activities harmlessly into the natural world in a way that is supportive of healthy human development."
Living so close to nature presents an ideal environment for raising children, with endless educational opportunities, giving them a deep appreciation for the natural world that lasts a lifetime.
 Our relationship with the land and nature takes on a new dimension when you add growing your food. Many residents garden near their homes, or in a shared space we call The Community Garden.
 The community also collectively manages a 2-acre blueberry orchard that members are free to pick during the summer harvest.
 The land of The Farm is also protected by a Community Trust. We recognize that we are stewards of this land, only here for a little while. We hold the land in trust for the generations to come.
From the Trust document:
“To promote and ensure the ecologically sound and sustainable use of The Farm and its natural resources. This vision of the land is born from a deep reverence for all animals, plants, habitation, streams, wind and rain which recognizes the inter-connectivity and inter-dependence of all things.”
-------------------------------------------------------------------------------
A Founder Remembers
It is a hot dusty July day down an old logging road where our group of buses have landed in the late spring. We hear at the encampment that we have purchased a one thousand acre farm just down the road from us. This morning the horses and wagon are taking groups over to see the land.
We have just completed a four-month trip on the road following our teacher who has speaking engagements around the country. This morning they are happy and excited.
 We have purchased two mighty Percheron/Belgian draft horses, Mabel and Belle, to help us plow the garden that we are starting here in the meadow bottom where the schoolbuses are circled up around the edges. These gentle giants, golden brown in color, well muscled with blonde manes and big brown eyes, are hitched to the wagon and ready to go, stomping and snorting a little as we climb into the wagon and start up the rocky hill.
We turn right onto a small county road and turn left again to approach a gated entranceway to the land. Ahead we can see a white frame house and a large barn. The road goes past the barn and slopes gently downhill for at least a mile. It is breathtaking, with wide open sky and billowing cumulus clouds.
Pasture land lines the road and beyond the fields are oak forests. It feels as though I am in an epic film as I ride in the wagon and take in the vista as the road gradually and gently drops down into the woods. The kids pointed excitedly at the birds, at the turtles crossing the road and at deer grazing in the woods.
Beyond the main road we can see several logging roads branching out from a central area about 2 miles in from the gate. I hold on fast to the sides of the wagon taking in the panorama before me. We continue down a westerly road that begins to drop down, revealing limestone cliffs with a creek running along the bottom of the ledge. Little creeks run into the bigger creek. Pools of shimmering water sparkle in the dappled sunlight.
Belle and Mabel splash through the shallow creek water and start back up a road through another meadow to the main road. I felt exhilarated.
This is where I want to live, I think, right on this sunny hillside. I feel as though I have dropped back one hundred years as I ride in the horse wagon back up through the pastured fields to the gate and imagine our new life here in the Tennessee hills.
It's incredible! I thought, So big! Lots of fields we could farm alongside the main road.
The creek is beautiful with limestone cliffs and little waterfalls.
Night is falling and the whippoorwills are calling. The woods are absolutely raucous with tree frogs, cicadas and crickets. Fireflies flit in and around the meadow making the whole scene magical. A giant green luna moth is outside a window and the children are watching it with fascination. A fire has been started in a fire pit dug out on a little rise above the meadow. Caravaners gather around the fire to share our excitement.
These four months on the road have bonded us all in our desire to start a community of like-minded people and here we are, transplanted from California to rural Tennessee. We were given an invitation to park our buses on this land and we’ve been approached by a farmer with no heirs who will sell us his thousand acres of grazing land and logged-out forests for an amazing price of $70.00 an acre.
The roads are dirt logging roads. There are no structures on the land other than the main house and barn. Us hippies get busy and put our youthful backs into building our community.
My baby is the first to be born on the land. It is an act of courage for me to put us in the hands of our midwives. We have a strong feeling that birth and death are sacraments and should be returned to the people. We want to birth our babies at home, trusting that birth is a natural process that women have been doing out of a hospital for millennia.
We will be able to have our own cemetery and keep our elders at home with their loving families at their time of transition.
We will grow as much of our own food as we can. The land is rich with water. Springs originate here, and the creeks flow full year round.
We will school our own children and teach them good values.
We will practice kindness and be like a big family.
Today, 50 years later, the protected forest has grown tall and full. To us our land is sacred. So many babies born, so many graves in our little cemetery, so much joy and sadness has passed through these gates.
So much hope expressed for our world’s future. So much has been learned. Ideals are tested in reality and the most practical remain.
We have many viable businesses. Our houses are beautiful and sturdily built. Our roads are paved. We have a solar school and a Community Center, our own grocery store and soy dairy.
Some of our values have endured and some have not. Younger generations are expressing their version of The Farm. We are no longer all vegetarian. We allow alcohol on the property. We have some chickens and goats.
What has endured is an abiding love for this land and for each other. It can get rocky at times working out our agreements, but we encourage open dialogue, compassion and empathy.
Some of our children are now raising families here, and some have moved on. We enjoy having four generations now on the Farm. We continue to take on new members, which enriches us in many ways.
Our spiritual practices are more individual now, with respect for all. We are nonviolent. No weapons are allowed. Stewarding the land and environment remains of utmost importance.
Our fervent hope is that we can continue to be an example of what a small group of people can do to change the world. We need to talk more and learn about what worked in building community and what didn’t work. We need to look at our shadow side with discernment and openly admit that some things did not work. This will increase our viability into the future and provide a working model for how to live in harmony with nature and other humans. A most important goal.
A Response
There are times when I read postings from people who used to live here or visited us long ago and are sad because they believe the romanticized version they have of our collective vision and actions are no longer being realized.
And yet, when I read your memories this morning, I’m struck that our very existence here in community is revolutionary—and evolutionary. We should never take for granted how much love, coordination, and unity of purpose it takes for us to hang together like this year after year. Whatever we successfully figure out for ourselves is adding to the wisdom and sanity of the world around us.
|
||
|
Thank you for your time and attention!
Douglas Stevenson
Douglas@villagemedia.com www.douglasstevenson.com Village Media www.villagemedia.com
|
