Cohousing-L Mailing List: Much Ado

[lilbert (lilbert]

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>From: "Kay Argyle" <argyle [at] mines.utah.edu>
>To: Multiple recipients of list <cohousing-l [at] freedom2.mtn.org>
>Subject: Re: Seniority-Much Ado About Nothing
>Date: Tue, Oct 31, 2000, 4:38 PM

>
>> There are so many issues that get brought up that nobody ever replies to.
>
> Examples, please?  It seems to me there is considerable discussion of the
> nuts and bolts of achieving affordability, diversity, simplicity,
> community, environmentally sound practices ... and patience.

Some talk, but not much in the way of commitment to achieving it, by looking
at the results.
>
> When I'm making baby steps towards some distant goal, and somebody who is
> further along the road gets impatient and disdainful of my efforts, I
> question whether that road is one I want to be on.

If my opinion makes you want to stop developing cohousing, then you haven't
got the guts to live in cohousing. It can be very hard work to look at
yourself as others see you.

>That's true whether the
> goal is moral, physical, educational or anything else.  I have a right to
> be a beginner, even if it means I make mistakes, that I'm unoriginal,
> clumsy, or insufficiently devoted.  If the "enlightened ones" are
> intolerant of my not having achieved perfection yet, I'm going to stay
> imperfect, by choice.

Oh, stop pouting. Ask anyone who lives here with me. I'm not perfect. Do I
have to be to have an opinion? Or was I just too close to the truth for you?
I realize I'm being pretty bad today. But I'm trying to get people to THINK
instead of resting on their laurels. Sometimes it's important to be
challenged by someone who disagrees with how things are going. There have
been several times in our meetings that one of us has had the courage to
disagree when consensus was imminent, and we've made better, and DIFFERENT
decisions because of it.
>
> Kay Argyle
> Wasatch Commons