August 2024 Great Story

In my home co-op in Ann Arbor, there is magic every spring. Tucked away from the relative bustle of the engineering campus, nestled comfortably into the crest of a hill, the house and its modest courtyard abounds with what I’ve decided to call a permaculture of beauty. Winter melting away, the trees budding, baby bunnies and groundhogs emerge from burrows to munch on the lush clover lawn, and, if you’re there for the right moment, paying the right kind of attention- Spots red and yellow, ephemeral and dependable. I don’t know who or how or when, but someone gave the future a great gift: Tulips. Once established, they don’t take much care to keep going, and like clockwork they sprout and, dependable, intrepid, bloom. Did the people who planted these know I’d be standing here to enjoy them all these years later? Did they do it for me, or was seeing the blooms just the next year enough for them, and the longer-form dividends of their work and care simply a welcome consequence? What lives have these bulbs seen and lived, transformations of life and soil and people and heart borne by this place that holds people at such an intense part of their lives? Do they hold with them memories of outdoor concerts, meetings, bonfires, parades of skunk kits grand-marshaled by their mother?

Co-opers spend a great deal of time sitting in the shade of trees they did not plant. And yet- The sun shines eternal. And so we plant more. 

Student housing cooperatives specifically have something of a memory problem. With the rising and falling tides of university life comes an ebb and flow of members- since folks don’t ever stay here that long, most houses have a living memory that only goes back two or three years. If you’re going to make changes here, you’d better plan for that. Since I’m here doing climate work, and there’s only so much one person can do in eight months, I know building capacity in a truly lasting way is the only way to truly have this role succeed. 

A few years ago, a VISTA came and did some really excellent work at the SHC, including starting a Green Team, a strong attempt at a nonhierarchical volunteer organization operating within the SHC to educate members about sustainable living practices. It met every other week, with rotating facilitators and notetakers- about a year in, when they forgot to pick a new facilitator at the end of a meeting, and then they never met again.

That house I was talking about before- It was built in the early ‘70s using the first HUD loan ever given to a student housing cooperative. People had to lobby for that. People had to, in the late 1960s, travel to Washington, DC. to ask for this money, and it took years. And then it took three years to build. In particulars, it’s changed lots over the years, but it’s been a co-op the whole time. At some point someone went and planted tulips all over the place. I don’t live there anymore, but the shade that particular tree casts changed my life.

I’m helping re-start the Green Team now, and I’m pulling out all the stops. I don’t claim to know what can make an effort last forever in a place like this, but I know what I can do to give it the best shot I can: Making sure there’s someone whose chore it is to keep the thing going, good agendas, a healthy rhythm (and a standing meeting time and place!), and a clear sense of positive community. And I make sure not to go to all of their meetings- if they’re going to keep meeting without me, they need to start off that way. And I’m happy to report they’re doing well! They have, for the moment, access to all of my cooperative experience and wisdom (and intimate knowledge of our organization’s google drive), a Discord where they swap ideas and plan meetings, and plans for engaging more members and taking on more ambitious projects. I’m trying to encourage them to do things I like, like building out educational resources, making members aware of local civic events, and telling stories, but ultimately it only has to work for the people who’re there, so they’ll do whatever they think is right. But the bulbs are in the ground now- soon, they’ll have to grow on their own.