The idea for this group has been stirring around in my brain for a while now.After my shop had been closed for a bit, I found myself missing the community of my staff and customers. I missed hearing the tidbits of your lives that come with putting together a catering order. Why the phrase you’re asking me to write on that cake is so meaningful but weird. What we’re making for your sons’ college graduation dinner…thank god, it only took him SIX years…things like that. Connections, however brief, that let me get to know so many people in our area just a little better.
When I looked around at public meet ups around our area, it was…lacking. The harder I tried to shove myself into social situations, the more futile it felt. I started thinking “I’m going to have to build this myself, aren’t I?!” But life is busy and starting things from nothing is hard, so I never really got very far.
And then Trump got sworn in. Things got so bad, so fast. I’m googling “What to do when Fascism is taking hold” frequently. The answer I keep coming up with is Community. The same thing I had been looking for and thinking about building. So I really started thinking about ways I could build a community of my actual neighbors, where people would want to participate.
I know people are always intrigued when I talk about canning, or weird cooking technique or making kokedama. These are all skills that come pretty easily to me, but I sure as shit don’t know how to make a PDF. Every one of you reading this has something they can teach the rest of us. Let’s put our natural diversity to work for us, fill in the holes of our own knowledge with some help from our neighbor.
That’s the basic premise of a skillshare, learning and sharing with the people around you, people who you might actually see while grocery shopping or at the pool. Actual connections that could blossom to real friendships, if that’s what you’re looking for. Maybe you come to meet new people. Maybe you come to see the people you already know, but would like to know better! You might even get a phone number after a meeting, old school style. Fuck off Bumble BFF, we have crafts and snacks!
There will be some loose rules and by laws, some of which will change or add on as the group evolves. This is an incomprehensive list of guidelines for the first few meetings, my general ideas that are subject to change. I’m going to give you some idea of how I think this will go. You can be the judge if it sounds like your cup of tea or not.
The first rule is it has to be FUN and EASY. If we’re all collectively going to make time in our lives to keep something like this going, you gotta look forward to it. We’ll be connecting with others who want to learn or share an interest and we’ll be having a great time doing it.
The experience of hosting and attending has to be low effort. Our vibe is relaxed but excited-we will not sweat floors that haven’t been vacuumed or a lawn that has not been mowed. We are eating off of paper plates(Ok we’ll use compostables even though Bezos almost just sunk Venice with his tacky wedding. We are not the problem.) and we are bringing our own folding chairs sometimes. We roll with it.
The meetings will be at a set time every month and will start and end SHARP. We’ll have a consistent, set day and time for our meetings. You’ll be able to schedule them on your calendar months in advance. If you can’t come one month, you’ll know the topic and date of the next meeting. Regular cadence is what will keep this going. Same with the start and end times, they need to be rigid to keep everything on track. Nobody has 1/2 hour to diddle around while people straggle in and the meeting starts late. Nor do we have an extra hour on the back end to “tie up loose ends”. If we’re going to have a meeting that will differ from our norms, it will be publicized well in advance so you can make arrangements.
For this to work, we need people to PARTICIPATE. You gotta sign up and show up. Talk to strangers. Put your goddamn phone away, say hello to your neighbors and mean it. Leave your anxiety in the car, or bring it on your shoulder to show it who’s boss. You will never beat the level of cringe i have coursing through my veins, try to one up me if you dare.
I’m going to need some volunteers to do things like set up a contact list, video the teaching lessons and a million other things. I can carry the load myself in the beginning but I can’t do it all indefinitely. It’s easy to make friends when you’re sharing Google docs!
Since you found this page, you are aware that I’m forming this group with as little traditional social media as possible. There will never be a Facebook page to join or show your friends. No properly curated Instagram feed. I’m deeply uncomfortable with supporting anything owned by Zuckerberg and his international propaganda machine, but getting the word out even with a lingering Instagram presence is TOUGH. The Comfortfood Insta/Fb pages(how you found this substack, probably) will stay up to direct people here for information. My interest in starting this group is to make a real impact on our collective lives, not to become an influencer(shudder, no thank you). The “Notes” portion of Substack will act as a short form photo feed. I post cooking related short essays there, and pics from my farm job with the sheep.
You can follow this Substack, and it will be delivered right to your email when I post. I try not to inundate y’all with too many emails, but I do send out the occasional essay or post promoting our meetings. You can read the Substack at any time without signing up or giving me your email, and I don’t believe in paywalling the good info. Access is free for everyone and will stay that way.
The topics of the meetings can be so varied, almost anything is on the table. I skew towards the practical domestic tasks that have fallen by the wayside in our culture-growing your own food, foraging, food preservation…those skills are right in my wheelhouse and make easy topics for future meetings. Not every meeting has to be about learning, though! I’m thinking cookbook club meetings, picnic lunch with a tour of a local public garden, an uber local community buy nothing group, a garden bounty redistribution system(that’s a fancy way of putting your extra zuchinni on your neighbors front porch).
I am willing to absorb the cost of these first few meetings to get the ball rolling. Eventually, there will probably need to be a drop in meeting fee, potentially a yearly membership that could be paid all at once. Hosting is expensive and time consuming, people who generously offer their homes as venues should not also have to lose money in the process. Supplies, even if it’s just paper plates and to go containers for extras all incur a cost. We’ll cross that bridge when we come to it.
No, you cannot bring your kids or your dog. Sorry, but they are both tripping hazards and a distraction around large groups. Just no.
Anyone who is NOT OK with what is going on in the world right now is invited to join. Women, men, unicorn…however you identify is a-ok with us. Unless, of course, you are a Trump supporter. Then I would unkindly invite you to go fuck yourself. You’re not welcome here and you wouldn’t be comfortable anyway. We are a group that celebrates diversity, believes science and treats other humans with respect and dignity. You won’t fit in.
I’m not kidding myself, I understand that this will be a group of mostly women but I do want to stress that anyone is welcome. A preliminary motto-“You can have a dick, but you can’t BE a dick.” If that offends you, you probably won’t like me as the leader. I say what I mean and generally don’t sugar coat it, I also curse like a…well, a foodservice worker. I yam what I yam, what can I say?
This isn’t a drinking club. If you can’t leave your house and have conversations with your neighbors without a bottle of wine, I would recommend a different kind of meeting(said without judgement). Sure, alcohol is a great social lubricant, but I surmise that it actually hinders actual connection.
I invite your suggestions to help shape the club moving forward, I hope this can be a collaborative effort that will be sustainable over time. I’m curious as to what new groups and friendships will be an offshoot of the club.
Remember, what I’m forming doesn’t really exist here in our community now, at least not that I’m aware of. Sure, you can join already formed single interest clubs, I’m only partially reinventing the wheel here. But I’m hoping for something bigger than a shared love of knitting or reading. I’m hoping that by being open to jump into uncharted waters, we can make some real connections to lean into when times are tough. This is a big project, one that I think will succeed for a number of reasons. Most of all, because I think we need to get back to knowing the people in our communities as humans. We’re all regular, thinking people with lives and problems and no support systems. Maybe we can change that. I’m building a stoop that we can collectively have coffee on every morning.
Come join me and lets build a community of friends and neighbors who give a shit about each other.
Love this so much! Sad I am finding this after the cake picnic but ain’t no thing!
Yes. When and where. Will bring two friends