Cohousing-L Mailing List: Re: ROMANTICIZING COHOUSING

[Deb Smyre (dsmyre]

Allen, your examples remind me of communes in the 60s.  Free love, flower
power, groovy baby.  Swinging - the 60s term for polyamory/serial monogamy
- isn't really romance.  It's an alternative lifestyle that can be
destructive to relationships in the long term, and I wouldn't choose to
live in a cohousing community that supported it.

Deb

At 09:46 PM 10/17/1999 -0500, allenbutcher [at] juno.com wrote:
>
>I've been thinking more about the comment that Rob posted a while back
>about possible futures of cohousing.  It is certainly possible that some
>communities may lose their cohesiveness, yet it is also possible that
>some may develop even closer relationships among residents.  I suspect
>that living in close proximity can help to nurture a variety of different
>types of relationships.  There are probably cases in cohousing where
>marriages or other significant relationships have broken up and
>individuals have reformed into new partnerships or marriages, perhaps
>with other residents of the community.  All of the adults may remain in
>the community, just changing residences, and the children involved then
>have a richer range of parenting adults.  This is, of course, called
>serial monogamy, while the difference is that in cohousing separated
>partners can be supported in maintaining at least friendly relations.  
>
>
>Another form of relationship pattern or lifestyle choice that might
>evolve in some cohousing communities is where some adults may have more
>than one intimate relationship within the community, with all those
>involved being fully aware of the relationships and mutually supporting. 
>This relationship pattern is called polyamory.  There are probably all
>kinds of stories out there, but I really don't expect anyone to talk
>about them on this list as it would be difficult to respect anonymity in
>this network.  The cohousing movement is big, but with the traveling
>people do among communities, many people must be quite familiar with many
>different communities.  Actually, that would be a way to maintain
>anonymity, as one could always just state that the story was from another
>community, but then, that would sound much like a rumor, and who then
>would believe the story?
>
>
>There is potential here for someone to write a fantastic cohousing
>romance novel, maybe even a screen play that could be made into a movie
>.. hmmmmmmm, what to call it?  If done well, it could be the best
>marketing for cohousing!  Cohousing is all about relationships among
>people after all ....   As a matter of fact, such a book could be written
>online, with different people contributing different chapters.  Another
>list I am on has done this, putting together an online book about
>education in community.  Any romance writers in cohousing?               
>Allen