Stay in Touch - Story and Poem "Community"

My experience with community began back when I was born in 1950 in Luton,Bedfordshire,England.
Now in 2007 my community is a small town on the other side of the world called Wanaka in the south Island of New Zealand.
Living in various communities since 1950 has taught me a lot about the importance of community life, up until I moved to Wanaka after the breakup of my marriage in 1993 I never really understood the full importance of community life, I then experienced a special community very different from the ones I had lived in before.
I will talk about Wanaka a little later but first from 1950 to 1966 where I grew up as a child my community was on the Hockwell ring estate in Luton, my memories as a child were sometimes hard with my parents working all hours to keep us in home and food, my father worked nights for 18 years at the Vauxhall car factory and my mum knitted hats in the evenings to bring in the extra money we needed. It was a disciplined home, we had to behave and show respect.
I remember we seemed to be always out playing in the fields and down by the river, it was safer outside then, we had room to grow play, where as at home with three brothers we kept getting into trouble with mum and dad.
I also remember the fields where we played disappeared when they started to build house's on them for the London overspill in the 60's.

Then in 1966 I joined the Army as an apprentice Carpenter and the next 7 years the Army was my community. Again Discipline played a big roll in my growth as a human being.
I got married 10 months before I left the Army in 1972, we lived in Germany for 10 months before we lived back in Luton where we were both born. The next 12 years we lived in 4 different house's the last one we brought and lived there for 8 years.
In This community I started to notice and understand how important our community really was. In 1977 we had a street party for the celebration of the Queens silver Jubilee, here the whole street joined in. It was amazing to see everyone talking to each other and even to see people talk to their neighbor and some had never met personally before. It was such a great day for everyone, that people were saying we should do this every year. But sadly by the time a year had passed everyone had slipped back into their fears etc and it never happened again while we were there for the next 7 years.
During this time we were burgled twice and my carpentry tools were stolen from my van. We did not feel safe in our own home, we then decided to apply to Emigrate to New Zealand where my brother had been living a few years.
I was very patriotic and found it a hard decision to make at first but then I looked at my community which I was losing trust in and then at my country, the future didn't look good with the Nuclear Energy issue and the weapons from Russia and America pointing everywhere, for us as parents we decided that England as a country was not a safe place to bring our children up and we wanted to give them a better chance in life and New Zealand offered better opportunities not only for them but also for us and it was Nuclear free.
This process took about 4 years before we were finally excepted, because we felt unsafe in our community in Luton, while waiting we moved to a small village on the Somerset/Dorset border where we lived for 18months before we finally emigrated to NZ in April 1986.

This time living on a farm in rural England was a wonderful time in our lives and it was harder to finally leave England from there than it would have been from Luton where we had lived most of our lives before.
Living a village life in Rural England showed me a real English way of life which hadn't changed in hundreds of years, the sad part of village life in England was the lack of jobs and young people from the village couldn't get work and had to move to the cities and big towns to get jobs.
Living on a farm we spent a lot of time walking and enjoying the environment, the wildlife, the rivers, the woods and our two children loved helping John the farmer who always loved them being around. It was such a special time in our lives the fear and distrust of big Luton was soon forgotten, replaced with a joy of being alive in Rural England.
Then the opportunity to go to NZ came and we had to make a big decision, it was hard to leave this beautiful part of England but our children would still of had to go to the Towns and cities for jobs and the fear of a nuclear accident was still in our thoughts, so we decided to give NZ a try.

The first few years in Auckland NZ were unbelievable every one was so friendly every one smiled and said hello when passing each other in the street. Then in 1987/88 that started to change.
At the same time the Wall street stock market crashed and because we had just left a place of distrust and fear I noticed the same patterns re-appearing for the first time in my community in NZ.
A recession hit NZ, I had three people working for me and I had to lay them off as work became scarce.
I started to realize that money played a big part in how our communities survived and how people reacted against each other.

In England because of unemployment and low wages money played a big part with issues within our community, the cost of living was rising, consumerism was becoming more expensive, those at the lower scale were being forced into crime, stealing, drugs, etc etc to get money to keep up with the cost. Therefore people were being burgled and robbed which brought about distrust and fear.

In NZ the issues were relatively new after the wall street crash, New Zealanders had invested their life savings their house's in business's that went bust and lost everything. For them this created a fear and distrust in people and because they had lost a lot some would become dishonest to try to get back what they had lost, so the money issue again played its part in creating separation and unbalance within community life.
By the end of the recession my marriage was on the rocks, not blaming the recession for it as it was probably going to happen anyway but I do believe it played a big part in speeding up that process, with some people a lack of money creates depression and negativity which is not healthy for relationships on a personal or community level.

In 1993 after my 21 marriage ended I left the city of Auckland and moved south to the rural community of Wanaka in the south Island, just like my move from a Luton in England to the village life, my move to Wanaka was again a move from distrust and fear to a place of people friendly and happy.
The next 7 years was to be a life changing time for me where I had escaped the capitalist money orientated city life to the Adventurous peaceful rural life by a lake and mountains which opened me up to understand more about the spiritual aspects of life.

When I first came here at the end of 93 my life had fallen apart and I was drawn to Wanaka because my best friend was always talking about the place and for me it was miles away from a place of sadness.
6 months later that sadness was forgotten, in its place was not only a beautiful town by a lake with snow capped mountains but also a place filled with happy, friendly and adventurous people.
I personally learned to ski and skied 30-40 days a winter, I was mountain biking and hiking in one of the most beautiful places on Earth, to me if heaven is on Earth then I had found it.
People stopped and talked, they listened, they supported each other with personal issues and they knew how to enjoy life.
Wanaka and the people opened a lot of doors for me that gave me the answers to a lot of questions that my issues needed answering, before Wanaka my life was falling apart and the people around me where unhappy and negative.
Living here has made me realize just how important community life is for a happy and balanced life.

The sharing on all aspects of life,is I believe the most important factor. In Wanaka people understand the importance of being heard, there are spaces and associations within the community which regularly have meetings where people can be heard on community issues, there are also places for personal ones if required.
Wanaka also attracts a lot of retired people and in the time I have lived here I have not met a fearful person but back in England most of the older generation live in fear, that is sad considering they have been through at least one world war which was to create a more peaceful world.
The youngsters here because of the nature of the place grow up full of adventure and positive growth.

I was in England for 13 months in 2001/02, it was sad to see the continuing decline of community life.
To each individual the most important aspect of life is family, the second most important aspect of life is our community. Strong family life is a good foundation for a strong community. Unfortunately these days our families are separated all over the world which means the communities are separated too, there are no longer strong foundations to our family life.
While I was there I tried to create a space where people could gather to express their concerns, views, ideas, skills and life's experiences.
This space is called a sharing circle or Sharing group, my experience with these have been amazing, not only for dealing with my issues and personal growth, they gave me the confidence to gain back control of my life and most of all the strength to stand up and be heard.
I have seen a big change in others and the way issues are resolved not only on a personal level but also on a community level.
I did not have any luck in getting this off the ground in two communities that I grew up in Luton, mainly I believe because of the unknown factor of this process but also after spending a day walking and talking to people in the community, they had either given up, did not trust the council,or lived in fear of going out at night to such meetings. I still feel very strongly that this would be a good process to help towards unifying communities in England.

The situation our communities find themselves in is an accumulation of issue’s over the years that have not been dealt with in a resolving way.
Society is quick to pass judgment and blame on certain sections of our community for the unbalance that is there. This is not a healthy way to resolve the issues, it will only alienate them even more, and after all we are all still living within the same community.
We have to look at new ways to resolve and rebuild.
There is a section on this website which looks at Sharing circles/Groups so I will not go into detail here.

We live at a fast pace of life, aspects of our life need to slow down so that we can deal with issues as they arise. By connecting back to our communities through group sharing, it will bring our focus back home.
Sharing Circles because they are in a circle have a calming influence on the direction it takes, mainly because we do not feel alone, we feel supported, we are heard.
Fear of being alone is a big issue for many people, in our communities the separation is very deep.
This process within our community will ease that fear. If we had them it would be a place to gather for support when we need it.

We do have in our society AA and Narcotic groups, but for them it is the last straw, we should not have to wait till it is nearly too late to seek help.
One of the cause’s I believe is that with the media being focused mainly on world affairs especially over the last thirty years, it has taken our focus away from our own back yard.
With the fears and distrust that has been created in our world we have switched ourselves off and let our communities fall apart. It is time to switch back on and change our focus.
We have to start taking responsibility for our own lives and community, after all it’s ours.
To create peace on earth we must start with peace at home, and watch it grow.

In 2001 my community in Wanaka was going through a big change where two big developing companies brought a lot of land around the lake and started to chop down trees and build houses just where ever they liked. In the beginning they got away with a little then the community realized what was happening and started to speak at the monthly council forum
and groups of people got together some in circles and some in Local Associations and went to the local council to express their concern at the way the town was changing.
It had such an effect on the council that at the next election the council at the time got voted out and a new council came into power that created workshops in the community and asked how we wanted our community to look like in 2020.
It was an amazing experience, for many of us who had moved there from all over the world we had never experienced this from a local council. Now area's of natural beauty cannot be built on and a lot of area's have restrictions on how many houses can be built there.

Now in 2007 the town is growing into a place that the community had a voice in what they want it to be like.
There are still big issue's for the council like affordable housing for the lower paid etc because what was once a quite small town is now a popular place to live not just for New Zealanders but also wealthy people from all over the world. Like most beautiful places in our world the world through the WWW.com has caught up with a small town by a lake on the South Island of NZ.

In 2001 after a sharing circle which brought up a lot of our community issues I wrote a long poem about my life in Community, here it is.

Community

Many years ago in 1950,

I arrived in a community with a vision and a destiny,

Times seemed hard and sometimes felt tough,

Dad worked for his pay and came home angry with his stuff.

 

I remember as a boy being outside, having a play,

It was safer in the streets, the fields and having fun in the hay,

Our doors were never locked, neighbors and friends popped in,

For a cuppa, a chat and the odd glass of gin.

 

Then in the sixties the fields we used to play,

They started building houses the fields got further away,

They tore down old prefabs, put high rise flats in there place,

Now outside was a feeling of being unsafe.

 

Where was my path what happened to my vision,

The pains in my heart were replaced with the television,

By the seventies my town was almost a city,

I settled down had kids and looked at my community.

 

What Doe's that word mean, comm-unity,

I looked at peoples faces they were angry, sad and full of pity,

By the eighties tools stolen from my van was not nice,

My daughter assaulted over the park and we were burgled twice,

One night my wife forgot her key to the door,

Halfway through a window, a thief stole her bag and got a good look at her drawers.

 

What has become of the human race,

Feeling trapped insecure and not very safe,

Missiles pointing everywhere, earths destruction a fear,

Wondering whether humanity will last the year.

 

My hearts desire was to get out of this place,

We looked afar for a new safe space,

My brother had been in New. Zealand for a couple of years,

It sounded great and miles away from all these fears.

 

Being in Auckland was a nice place to be,

After living in Luton, you'd know what I mean,

Lots of space, friendly people popped in for a chat,

Then the market crashed, old patterns reappeared and all that crap.

 

 

Again locked doors, distrust no longer free,

Now out of balance what causes it of course, money,

Feeling pain in my heart not happy with what I see,

21 years of marriage fell apart, it was time to leave the city.

 

Again feeling unsafe not knowing where to go,

I decided on Wanaka, to learn to play in the snow,

Driving past Mt Iron looking out at what I could see,

A feeling of excitement, it felt like the place for me.

 

For seven years now I've rarely locked my door,

There's trust,support,life's no longer a chore,

Happy and friendly faces the world passes through and sees,

A very special community almost living in harmony.

 

All of a sudden the towns growing very fast,

Worries and fears again haunt from the past,

Who's planning this, who decides how we grow,

A lot of people I know are not happy with the flow.

 

All of us in Wanaka are part of this community,

Its a shame some fill their pockets and live life with greed,

Can't they see life here has a abundance for all,

The healthy,the wealthy,the weak and the small.

 

Life has been full and happy in this beautiful place,

It gives me strength but most of all hope for the human race,

I've realized my vision and destiny,

By living in balance and not being greedy,

My door is always open so please feel free,

Pop in for a chat and a cup of herbal tea.

 

February 2001

:)

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