Cohousing-L Mailing List: Move-in During the Pandemic

[Barbara Simkowski (barbara_simkowski]

We are less than a month from move-in, here at Village Hearth Cohousing in 
Durham, NC. After years of planning, writing guidelines, practicing sociocracy, 
learning how to run meetings, dealing with Zoom so that distant members could 
participate—everything that forming communities go through—we are ready. More 
than ready. Excited to finally be in the beautiful cottages we watched grow 
from the mud of North Carolina.

But the virus hit just at this time and out of an abundance of caution we’ll be 
instituting good public health practices to protect even the most vulnerable 
members. Perhaps our Common House will not be the refuge we anticipated until 
the viral stew out there eases its grip on us. Perhaps the group hugs and 
clinked glasses will have to wait. I am personally sad that though some of the 
great benefits of cohousing will obtain, others need to be put off still longer.

I would not want to be anywhere else during this pandemic, don’t get me wrong. 
But Covid-19 is the “elephant in our Common House,” as it were! I just want to 
express my sadness at the delay.



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