Monday, July 19, 2010

Group Theory

Here are some groups I wish existed -or if they exist locally, I wish I knew where they were.

  • An eco-group to provide gentle challenge, support, and creative energy around personal and local green initiatives. I'm talking about everything from helping me get started with composting all the way to enhancing the bike paths and ideas I can' even come up with.
  • A non-fiction writer's group for people writing everything from dissertations to articles for journals to, say, knitting books.
  • a social action group. There's the DeKalb Interfaith Network for Peace and Justice, for which I am grateful. However, their issues and "style," if you will, have never been mine. I want a group that will cook for Hope Haven, knit for the children in Mongolia (or wherever), adopt a family at Christmas time, collectively be a Big Brother/Sister for a local child, figure out some sane response that individuals might take toward correcting the damage done by the oil spill in the Gulf.... maybe it would also be a social action book club.
  • a meditation group -could also be a yoga group. But I'm thinking here of a "don't just do something -sit there" sort of long meditation session once a week or once a month or on the summer solstice.... or something.


Clearly, I can't start all these groups right now, or I would have done it already. I couldn't even promise to attend the meetings all the time. I just think that this town would be enriched if they existed. I think my life would be improved, as would other people's. And I think I've reached the limit, for now, of the support that on-line communities can provide. I don't see myself turning away from the computer in some sort of Luddite revolt. I just want a little more in-real-life activity; not enough is getting done on the ground.

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