Cohousing-L Mailing List: Re: Graduating to Cohousing on Steroids

[Mac Thomson (macthomson]

Thank you for sharing this Sharon.

I would concur that the scale of cohousing makes us very dependent on 
volunteers, rather than paid professionals, to do the work of maintaining the 
community, which can become very challenging for community members with already 
very full lives.

And I would also concur that there are many, many flavors of community besides 
cohousing. All are to be celebrated in this world generally so lacking in 
community

-- 
Mac Thomson

Heartwood Cohousing
Southwest Colorado
http://www.heartwoodcohousing.com


"They that can give up essential liberty to obtain a little temporary safety 
deserve neither liberty nor safety."
              - Ben Franklin
**********************************************************



> On Jun 12, 2025, at 8:50 AM, Sharon Villines via Cohousing-L <cohousing-l 
> [at] cohousing.org> wrote:
> 
> The reason I have been signing my posts with just “Sharon” is that I have 
> moved out of Takoma Village Cohousing and into a senior community. Riderwood 
> Village is literally cohousing on steroids. Everything that existed at Takoma 
> Village exists at Riderwood. Diversity of all kinds, for example. 200+ groups 
> including services to the community, services to a local elementary school, 
> integration of programs with a community college, book discussions, library 
> management. 200+ is a lot and some are small or inactive. And the party 
> planners do promise that their parties end at 9:30 unless otherwise 
> appropriate (New Years Eve).
> 
> I began looking at a senior community 3 years ago because I could see the 
> toll that caring for her father who had had a stroke was taking on my 
> daughter. In the prime of her life, her fifties, when she had accomplished 
> professional success and finanacial security so she could “retire” early and 
> follow her dreams, she was spending days and weeks on the telephone or the 
> train to supervise his 24/7 care. She was tense and sick and in no shape to 
> even find out what her dreams might be.
> 
> Takoma Village was approaching its 25th anniversary and the founders who 
> remained in the community, including myself, were slowing down and more 
> frequently just not available to do the work of supporting the community. We 
> were adding to the work because we required more attention or were unable to 
> provide attention. For several years, someone had warmed a frozen dinner or 
> brought a dinner to a person who could no longer manage his microwave. It was 
> a quick task and those how took it on enjoyed both cooking and the 
> conversation. Then a 92 year old began being disoriented, particularly at 
> night. A visiting schedule was set up so someone visited her everyday to keep 
> her connected. Those examples are just 2 of many. 
> 
> At the same time, the buildings were all requiring their 200,000 mile 
> maintenance—the really big one of 20-25 years. These were major projects that 
> required making decisions about things we knew nothing about. On top of 
> having to hire large contractors to do the work, we had to hire engineers to 
> analyze what we needed. The contract for replacing the balconies and decks 
> was almost 4 inches thick. We were no longer able to act as a group making 
> facilities decisions by consensus because we knew very little about them. 
> Consent focused on accepting a contract that seemed reasonable. It wasn’t 
> like solar panels or insullation that many of us knew about. 
> 
> I gradually realized why other cohousing members had moved to senior 
> communities in their 80s because they felt unable to contribute. They 
> contributed a lot but they just didn’t have the energy to cope with thinking 
> about the on and on of facilities management, orienting new residents to 
> community values (which takes a lot of time and attention), and coping with 
> their own lives and their adult children’s problems. It is a rude awakening 
> to realize that those neat little families of 2 children would keep expanding 
> into infinity until we had to have a calendar to remember birthdays which 
> seemed to be happening weekly. 
> 
> My daughter’s stress level plummeted when I agreed to put down a deposit to 
> reserve a space at Riderwood. I still had no intention of moving. Over the 
> next 3 years I considered what Riderwood was really like. The experiences 
> that convinced me that it was a possible place to live were (1) whenever 
> anyone referred to “the community” they included the staff in the number. “A 
> community of 3,000+ people.” (2) They held a gay pride parade on campus that 
> included staff and residents and posted pictures on the website. (3) The 200+ 
> clubs are mostly “teams” who manage all the tasks that cohousers do for each 
> other. Except manage maintenance and repair and cooking meals. 
> 
> Cohousing has a scale problem. At 40-50 units, it is very difficult to 
> maintain the facilities in any other way than a monthly work day to clean and 
> do small repairs. The more expensive the units become the more people have to 
> work to pay for them. 
> 
> The “Neighbors in Deed” directory at Riderwood is 46 pages of names and 
> numbers of residents who have offered services: walking pets, opening jars, 
> changing batteries, hanging pictures, taking a photograph, sewing buttons, 
> mending, shopping, resetting clocks, wrapping packages, wake up calls, closet 
> cleaning, errands, help with technology.
> 
> Riderwood doesn’t stress it’s coninuing life care programs. It only admits 
> people into independent living and most of the staff is focused on making 
> independent living comfortable. Whatever I need, I call either "General 
> Services" to fix things or a coordinator of a team/service for information or 
> advice. Each door has a latch that someone sets late at night that flips up 
> when the door is opened. Any latch not tripped by about noon means a knock on 
> the door to be sure everyone is alright. They knocked on my door 4 times in 
> the first month. I was opening my door at 1-2 am to trip the latch, but the 
> staff had decided to set the latches at 3-4 am becuase many people were still 
> coming home at midnight. 
> 
> All of the security staff are EMS certified. If soneone is not okay, they 
> know what to do. “I’ve fallen and I can’t get up” calls are responded to in 
> 3-5 minutes.
> 
> This is only part of what life is like here. People are very welcoming and 
> friendly. People sitting next to each other talk to each other. It is 
> literally cohousing on steroids. There are 4 residential buildings around a 
> community building that is like a common house on sterioids — the wood shop 
> is incredibly well stocked, 2 resturants (casual and finer dining), a front 
> desk peopled 24/7, a bar open a few hours a few days a week, a craft  room, a 
> classroom, a laundry, a salon, a gym, etc. Garden plots—flowers or 
> vegetables. 
> 
> This is why I said I’ve graduated from cohousing. I want to figure out how a 
> community of 3,000 people manages to feel like a community when some are paid 
> staff and others residents and others are very busy volunteers. The Resident 
> Handbook is written by the Resident Coordinator’s team and is 150 pages. 
> Somehow it manages to maintain a friendly suggestive tone instead of 
> mandating rules. 
> 
> The residents also maintain a website of calendars, schedules, and email 
> lists. I was here for 3 days without knowing about “Chatterwood” which is a 
> general members list. It was a 3-day weekend and I really didn’t want to 
> bother staff with newby questions or go around knocking on doors. All of 
> which I could have done. But when I connected with an email list, I knew I 
> was home. (There are also lists for ride sharing, politics, etc.) The topics 
> are all the same as those on the Takoma Village members list.
> 
> One feature of having staff is there are many highschool and college students 
> who are running around. Three staff members where just promoted to management 
> positions who began 20 years ago as college students with scholarships. Gifts 
> and tips from residents to staff are “not allowed” because some staff are 
> less visible — they don’t want the bias. The discussion at lunch with 2 total 
> strangers was how to give gifts without violating the rules to 2 workers who 
> were graduating from college this month. They decided that if they went to 
> the graduation, they would not be giving Riderwood service gifts. These were 
> clearly friends.
> 
> So my plan is to continue writting about what cohousing could learn from 
> other kinds of residential communities. Many things that people say only 
> exist in cohousing is not true — many of them exist in traditional apartment 
> buildings and certainly in condos. There are some areas where senior 
> communities are behind cohousing and some that senior communities are ahead 
> of cohousing.
> 
> Sorry this is so long but I knew none of these things a few years ago and 
> they make the move understandable. Workshare is a continuing problem in 
> cohousing and I don’t see any alernatives without a change in scale.
> 
> Sharon
> ——
> Sharon Villines
> Riderwood Village, Silver Spring MD
> 
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