POETREE

Starting now, the Poetry Fishbowl is open! Today's theme is "Intentional Community." I will be checking this page periodically throughout the day. When people make suggestions, I'll pick some and weave them together into a poem ... and then another ... and so on. I'm hoping to get a lot of ideas and a lot of poems.

I'll be soliciting ideas for communards, neighbors, communitarians, hippies, Native American tribes, caregivers, first responders, clergy, outreach workers, artists, writers, polyfamilies, ethicists, activists, volunteers, handyworkers, repairmen, teachers, parents, comares, immigrants, superheroes, supervillains; from Daughters of the Apocalypse: armeys, carneys, muneys, naveys; other communal people, starting a community, living together, moving into a new home, welcoming the neighbors, lending a hand, responding to emergencies, volunteering, making donations, supporting people in hard times, learning to trust others, offering crash space, helping someone move, recommoning (creating space where people can share and tend land in relationship), placemaking, planting trees, creating intimacy, making friends, getting to know each other, cooking together, discovering things, improvising, adapting, cooperating, bartering, sharing, fixing what's broke, changing the world, accomplishing the impossible, intentional communities, communes, artist colonies, cohousing, sharehouses, boarding houses, common houses, planned communities, other polyhomes, Native American reservations, Triton Teen Centers, the Peace Store, food coops and other cooperatives, amenity floors, charities, homeless shelters, clothing banks, food pantries, soup kitchens, sobering centers, community clinics, mentor circles, support groups, churches, gay bars, feminist bookstores, social justice departments in schools, clubs, inclusive workplaces, Thalassia, the Maldives, the Lacuna, Rutledge, Emerald Mountain Glen (a hippie commune near Rutledge), LunaRest (an art colony near Rutledge), Ville de Roses (a French intentional village near Rutledge), Homemade Families classes, community gardens, other communal hangouts, intentional neighboring, interfaith work, diversity, inclusivity, housewarming parties, First Year clubs for people new in town, participatory decision-making, altruism, family dynamics, alternative family structures, partnerships not based on sex/romance, emotional closeness, nonsexual intimacies, first contact, interspecies relationships, trial and error, trust issues, teamwork, found family, complementary strengths and weaknesses, personal growth, and poetic forms in particular.


Currently eligible bingo card(s) for donors wishing to sponsor a square:

Ryan Gosling Movies Bingo Card 11-1-26


Among my more relevant series for the main theme:

An Army of One has most people living in tight-knit communities because they are in space.

Arts and Crafts America includes the Draft Dawgs Veteran Shelter.

The Bear Tunnels features historic tribal villages.

The Blueshift Troupers travel the galaxy helping colonies solve problems.

A Conflagration of Dragons leaves people to rely on each other or die.

Coracle Shores features people fleeing climate change into a faeryland of small villages.

Daughters of the Apocalypse relies a lot on mutual aid for survival. Armeys are military bands. Carneys travel together in caravans. Muneys share a commune. Naveys are nautical bands.
* Lazarus Lake
* Nadie's family farm
* Ninovan from "The Trail of Hope"
* Rainbow Hills

Fiorenza the Wisewoman lives in a small, tight-knit village.

Frankenstein's Family has diverse subgroups interacting to help each other.

Hart's Farm is a free love commune.

The Moon Door features a women's chronic pain support group, which involves a lot of intentional neighboring.

One God's Story of Mid-Life Crisis involves a close religious community.

Peculiar Obligations includes Quaker communities and pirate islands.

Polychrome Heroics has ordinary humans, supernaries, blue-plate specials, superheroes, supervillains, primal and animal soups all trying to get along together. Relevant threads include Antimatter and Stalwart Stan, the Big One, Cuoio and Chiara, Iron Horses, Officer Pink, Pain's Gray, Rutledge, Shiv , and Trichromatic Attachments. I encourage readers to prompt for any of the large casts and complex settings that I have already developed, such as:
* the bohemian folks at Hanson Hall in Omaha, Nebraska
* Prairie Meadows Cohousing Community and Mayfield Meadows Farm near Omaha, Nebraska
* Fertile Acres Farm just outside of Omaha, Nebraska (introduced in "So Monumental and Still")
* Woolgather Hill near Omaha, Nebraska
* Cowlick Ecovillage, Washington introduced in "A Human Scale, Full-Featured Settlement"
* the Mori no Tami and their allies at Mori no Mura in Humboldt County, California
* the hippies of Emerald Mountain Glen in Vermont
* the people and place of Fire Mountain Farm in Vermont
* Lazy Maple Lane near Rutledge, Vermont
* Bumbleberry Acres, a farm just southwest of Rutledge, Vermont (introduced in "Do Something Different Inside")
* the rescued sexbots in Thalassia
* the rescued primals now at the Blackfeet Reservation in Montana
* Havre Hobby Habitat in Montana
* the Withering Heights LARP in Colorado
* the Solace polycule in Atlanta, Georgia
* Nicholson family farm near Bluehill, Missouri
* the cohousing and polycule in Portland, Oregon
* the various polycules from "A Celebration and a Consolation" out east

Quixotic Ideas is set in a world with plenty of magic and a positive tone, where people often help each other and solve challenges peacefully.

Schrodinger's Heroes save the world from alternate dimensions, and they take care of each other.

Walking the Beat is lesbian romance with a lot of intentional neighboring.

Or you can ask for something new.

Boosting the signal will reveal a verse of any open linkback poem.

( New to the fishbowl? Read all about it! )

Ancient pollen reveals a surprising twist in the evolution of flowers

Ancient pollen reveals that extreme warming, rather than the asteroid that killed the dinosaurs, drove major changes in plant diversity millions of years ago.


Given the extreme warming due to climate change, expect the Anthropocene mass extinction to include a similar turnover, with many plant species dying out and new ones emerging with more resilience to current and future threats.

Want to help? Pick any plant type you like, as many as you like. Gather as much genetic diversity as you can. Breed them for climate resilience -- not just the hotter drier conditions prevailing in most places but the brutal whiplash weather that can go from freezing to 100°F in a day or drought to flood. You can also check what your local conditions will look like in 60 years, compared to a current location with similar traits, and explore what grows there that you might try in your yard now.

These are some posts from the later part of last week in case you missed them:
Recipe: "Oatmeal Coconut Chocolate Chip Cookies"
Wildlife
Ryan Gosling Movies Bingo Card 11-1-26
Birdfeeding
Writing
New Year's Resolutions Check In"
Safety
Samhain
Garden of Repose
Cyberspace Theory
Science
Food
Bingo
Birdfeeding
Poetry Fishbowl Report for October 6, 2026
Philosophical Questions: Emotions
Early Humans
Today's Adventures
Wildlife
Birdfeeding
Fossils
Nature
Unsold Poems for the October 6, 2026 Poetry Fishbowl
Gardening
Happiness
Artificial Intelligence
Follow Friday 10-30-26: Pirates
Space Exploration
Moment of Silence: Patrick Stewart
Gardening
Today's Adventures
Birdfeeding
Artificial Intelligence
Community Thursdays
Conservation
Today's Adventures
Art
Birdfeeding
Art
Hard Things

Food has 46 comments. Philosophical Questions: Genetics has 26 comments. Philosophical Questions: Rights has 41 comments. "Vocabulary: Cobra Chickens" has 21 comments.


"Save All the Pieces" belongs to The Big One. It needs $27 to be complete. Stylet talks more about what giant ground sloths eat.


The weather has been mild here. Seen at the birdfeeders this week: a mixed flock of sparrows and house finches, one male and two female cardinals, a bluejay, and a fox squirrel. Currently blooming: sweet alyssum, marigolds, million bells, petunias, portulaca, nemesia, fan flowers, pineapple sage, firecracker plant, tomatoes, frost aster, zinnias, purple aster.

Today is cloudy and mild.

I fed the birds.  I've seen a few sparrows and house finches.

I put out water for the birds.

EDIT 11/1/26 -- I did a bit of work around the patio.

EDIT 11/1/26 -- I started working on an outdoor repair project.

EDIT 11/1/26 -- I did more work on an outdoor repair project.

EDIT 11/1/26 -- I did more work on an outdoor repair project.

EDIT 11/1/26 -- I did more work on an outdoor repair project.

I've seen a squirrel running through the trees above the parking lot.

EDIT 11/1/26 -- I did more work on an outdoor repair project.

EDIT 11/1/26 -- I finished the outdoor repair project.

EDIT 11/1/26 -- I did more work around the patio.

EDIT 11/1/26 -- I did more work around the patio.

EDIT 11/1/26 -- I watered the new picnic table garden and the telephone pole garden.

A single cricket was chirping, low and slow.

As it is now dark, I am done for the night. 

We made it to the end of October! \o/ If you have completed some of your medium-term goals or subgoals, and/or you're still chugging away at your ongoing goals, then pat yourself on the back. You worked hard for that. We are now well into autumn. If you're doing seasonal goals, share what you're working on for this fall.

I'm continuing to track goals at the end of each month. So far it seems to be helping, so that's encouraging. I'm looking at my goal list more often and trying to keep ticking off more of them.

These are the previous check in posts:
New Year's Resolutions Check In January 9
New Year's Resolutions Check In January 16
New Year's Resolutions Check In January 23
New Year's Resolutions Check In January 30
New Year's Resolutions Check In February 28
New Year's Resolutions Check In March 31
New Year's Resolutions Check In April 30
New Year's Resolutions Check In for May (June 1)
New Year's Resolutions Check In June 30
New Year's Resolutions Check In July 31
New Year's Resolutions Check In August 31
New Year's Resolutions Check In September 30

( Read more... )

Tonight we did our Samhain ritual. This was the last in our set of creation myth sabbats, featuring the story of the Tohono O'odham people. We called quarters with mythic figures; I called Coyote. :D We read the myth aloud. For cakes and ale, we had prickly pear honey on crackers and cherry-apple cider.

We also discussed themes for the next year. Well, I suggested pageantry and interactive things, since we just did a year of mostly reading myths, then everyone latched onto that instead of suggesting different themes. Music, geometrical circle casting, using some of the figurines and other props we already own, etc. It should be fun.

Digital office communication affects stress, creativity, and perceived tone

Typed work messages lose their tone more often than senders realize, and employees that are expected to check work messages at home experience increased anxiety.


Written messages are always less clear than face-to-face messages, because they cannot carry important parts like voice tone and body language. People have been writing letters since writing was invented, and managed okay. But something about digital communication -- the speed, the medium, whatever -- seems to exacerbate the problem.  This has been known for decades now.  In casual communication, people often try to compensate with emoticons or similar techniques, which can help. But business communication doesn't do that, so it's at a disadvantage.

Basically, never assume that emotional interpretation is accurate in digital communication. If you think there's an issue, deal with it in person.

Museum visits reveal a surprising connection between boredom and learning

To test the idea, the team asked visitors whether the visit had been “too challenging for me” and whether it had been “not challenging enough for me.” Visitors who agreed more strongly with either statement also reported more boredom. The link was stronger for feeling underchallenged than for feeling overwhelmed.


Well, yeah. When you feel overwhelmed, that means your capacity for experiencing things has filled up and is spilling over.  It tells you to hole up somewhere and process the information while relaxing.  When you feel bored, it means your capacity for experiencing things is nearly empty. Boredom is a signal that your tank is low and you need to seek experiences and resources. That's not a bug, it's a feature.

Now here's another interesting point about museums. An ordinary person who is not free to leave and gets bored will probably either sit down and play on their phone, or talk to someone they came with. A nerd will either pull out a project ... or go back to the exhibits and examine them more closely looking for details that would be more interesting. Sometimes you find really cool tidbits on second glace.