Calliope
11-01-2007, 04:14 PM
65 Indian summer degrees in rural central Virginia today, the last day of my 3-week 'visit again' visitor period. My membership bid will receive community input, starting tomorrow, for 10 days - then it's either egalitarian utopia or abject homelessness for yours truly. What a frickin' drama my life has become. Wish me luck ladies, please. (Below, my 'exit letter.')
As a feminist culture, at Twin Oaks we tend to disregard traditional gender roles and behavior. Women and men choose their roles in the community based on their interests, strengths, and passions, not on anyone else's preconceived notions.
(From Feminist Culture, twinoaks.org.)
Hello, my name is Calliope and I am requesting membership in Twin Oaks community. I consider myself a feminist commie queer with a passion for music, kids, politics - and the ridiculous. Hopefully, this is my entrance, not exit, letter! If accepted, I would love to move here immediately after the 10-day input period; I will be staying at Acorn during that time.
I've enjoyed prep cooking, kitchen cleaning, laundry, food processing, pillow boxing, and hammock set-ups. My second visit has been characterized by learning more jobs and improving my understanding of basic labor tasks. If accepted as a provisional member, areas in which I'd like to work include the kitchen, food processing, seeds, laundry, tofu, hammocks - and anywhere cleaning is needed. I believe I would also be good at child care. I'm ready to move on my prior 'housewife' skills and certainly more than willing, even hoping, to learn new skills (stretchers, for example). I've a lot of energy to contribute as I believe my over-quota hours demonstrate.
My 3-week visit - this second time around - has been both stressful (worrying about again receiving rejections) and joyful (commanding more familiarity with the community and its expectations). I cannot emphasize enough my appreciation for the members here who have embraced me as a comrade, possibly a friend. To you, I give my sincerest appreciation - and love. There are so many warm and interesting people here! I have wanted to live here for many years (I was even accepted back in '98 when I was a 'guy') because I believe in Twin Oaks' values of socialistic cooperation, job rotation, non-competitive human relations and, more now than ever, freedom from mainstream gender imperatives.
As previously mentioned, I am the parent of two young children who live with their full-custodial mother. (A transition, preparing them to live with only her, began over a year ago.) With her they will receive private schooling and other privileges I can not provide. While I hope to offer my girls the opportunity to visit me at Twin Oaks for a week-long 'summer vacation' annually (should I be accepted as a member), I have indicated to the Child Board that should any event necessitate their requiring my full-time care, I would surrender my Twin Oaks membership. I believe I have successfully clarified my marriage / parenting history, face to face during this visit, with members who previously expressed concerns.
I acknowledge I am different. I dress oddly (Code Pink), play air guitar and "think I'm a woman (with a bit of a hormone imbalance)." I'm also sensitive under duress. I bounce back rapidly. I believe I am dependable in labor - and in human relations. Recasting a question Kat posed in Is It Utopia Yet?: Why would I want to live here, where I am obviously a misfit? I'll offer her words as the most apt: "Since I seem to have to choose between living with strangers who believe in profit and success, and strangers who believe in love and peace, I picked the nicer bunch."
Is there room for me here?
As a feminist culture, at Twin Oaks we tend to disregard traditional gender roles and behavior. Women and men choose their roles in the community based on their interests, strengths, and passions, not on anyone else's preconceived notions.
(From Feminist Culture, twinoaks.org.)
Hello, my name is Calliope and I am requesting membership in Twin Oaks community. I consider myself a feminist commie queer with a passion for music, kids, politics - and the ridiculous. Hopefully, this is my entrance, not exit, letter! If accepted, I would love to move here immediately after the 10-day input period; I will be staying at Acorn during that time.
I've enjoyed prep cooking, kitchen cleaning, laundry, food processing, pillow boxing, and hammock set-ups. My second visit has been characterized by learning more jobs and improving my understanding of basic labor tasks. If accepted as a provisional member, areas in which I'd like to work include the kitchen, food processing, seeds, laundry, tofu, hammocks - and anywhere cleaning is needed. I believe I would also be good at child care. I'm ready to move on my prior 'housewife' skills and certainly more than willing, even hoping, to learn new skills (stretchers, for example). I've a lot of energy to contribute as I believe my over-quota hours demonstrate.
My 3-week visit - this second time around - has been both stressful (worrying about again receiving rejections) and joyful (commanding more familiarity with the community and its expectations). I cannot emphasize enough my appreciation for the members here who have embraced me as a comrade, possibly a friend. To you, I give my sincerest appreciation - and love. There are so many warm and interesting people here! I have wanted to live here for many years (I was even accepted back in '98 when I was a 'guy') because I believe in Twin Oaks' values of socialistic cooperation, job rotation, non-competitive human relations and, more now than ever, freedom from mainstream gender imperatives.
As previously mentioned, I am the parent of two young children who live with their full-custodial mother. (A transition, preparing them to live with only her, began over a year ago.) With her they will receive private schooling and other privileges I can not provide. While I hope to offer my girls the opportunity to visit me at Twin Oaks for a week-long 'summer vacation' annually (should I be accepted as a member), I have indicated to the Child Board that should any event necessitate their requiring my full-time care, I would surrender my Twin Oaks membership. I believe I have successfully clarified my marriage / parenting history, face to face during this visit, with members who previously expressed concerns.
I acknowledge I am different. I dress oddly (Code Pink), play air guitar and "think I'm a woman (with a bit of a hormone imbalance)." I'm also sensitive under duress. I bounce back rapidly. I believe I am dependable in labor - and in human relations. Recasting a question Kat posed in Is It Utopia Yet?: Why would I want to live here, where I am obviously a misfit? I'll offer her words as the most apt: "Since I seem to have to choose between living with strangers who believe in profit and success, and strangers who believe in love and peace, I picked the nicer bunch."
Is there room for me here?