Cohousing-L Mailing List: Odds and Ends

[Joaniblank (Joaniblank]

I haven't posted for a while now so I want to offfer some brief comments on a
variety of subjects. Thus my not-very-helpful subject heading for this post.

1.. I agree with whoever said that many people who move into cohousing,
change their lifestyles a good deal just by moving into cohousing. An
individual or couple in their sixties who have lived and raised their
children in a single family home, no matter what their politics, are going to
find cohousing a more dramatically different "lifestyle" than does an
individual or couple in their early thirties wit a couple of kids, who may
very well have experience living in a student coop or a shared household
before moving into cohousing. 

2. Re: starting a business inside a coho community. Until we have a
generation of young people who have "grown up" in cohousing, I think it is
unlikely that this will happen on other than an 
extremely small (virtually individual) scale. Not only do most people moving
into chousing need every penny saved or earned to pay for mortgage or rent
(and therefore have no extra cash to see them through the first years of a
new business), but also, as long as we truly seek out age and other kinds of
diversity, the likelihood of two or three people in a small community having
the interest, the know-how and the capital to start one business within a
community seems pretty remote to me.  Attractive as it may seem to some,
having a business within the community may simply work better (only?) in a
community that has more intentionality, or intenetionality of a different
sort than is typically found in cohousing (say shared religious practice,
dedication to extreme simplicity, or a major commitment to organic farming
among all members)

4. Congratulations to the Highliners upon the occasion of their move-in. I
hope that your lives in cohousing are everything you have hoped for and more.


5. Here's a strangers-peering-in-the-window true story that might tickle the
fancy of some of you concerned about gawkers. A couple of weeks ago I was
returning home at about 11:30 at night. At the top of the stairs on the
second floor landing I encountered two men and one woman who, I assumed, were
leaving after visitng one of my upstairs neighbors. Wrong! They asked me if
there was a coffee house open "now"in our common space. They knew that this
was cohousing and just wanted to "check it out." I politely told them to go
away and call me in the morning. (I am the designated PR and visitor
management person here). If I hadn't been so stunned at their chutzpah, I
might have been more stern with them. One of my neighbors suggested I should
have threatened to call the police, or actually done so.  

6. Someone suggested becoming a consultant to your own business as a possible
work alternative to daily commuting. I almost did that last year until our
accountant informed me that the IRS frowns mightily upon this practice that
is the practice of changing anyone who has been an employee into an
independent contractor. You can easily guess why they might well find this
problematic.