Page 26 - C.A.L.L. #46 - Summer 2020

A community far in the west of Germany

We are a community of 15 adults and 6 children currently. We became conscious of Corona
rather slowly, gradually seeping into our community. Three weeks ago, we decided, with heavy
hearts, to cancel our beginning of spring public singing event, and celebrated the evening only
internally, but a week ago we found ourselves discussing how we want to be seen to the
outside world - since our community is located in the middle of the village – and how to deal
with visitors. Yes, outwardly we keep the rules, we only go for walks in pairs and are not seen

to be gathering as a large group close to the perimeter of the property. Internally, however,
we continue to live our community life as before. There is a common lunch, we have our group
meetings, yoga takes place, we have our cinema evenings, we work together in the garden and
the children wander from apartment to apartment, always looking for new ideas and
relationships. The only difference is that there is nobody from the outside with us. This
means that all our public cultural events, our info days and group meetings with people from
the surrounding area are cancelled.

For some of us the Corona virus is purely abstract, because our life here means that little
from the outside is noticeable. Others who work outside feel, when they come home, relief

due to the looseness and relaxation that prevails here, in contrast to many situations at
work. But after the first few weeks the question arises here too: “Can we do this? Just
carry on living like this and enjoy our island here?” We ask the question: “Is everyone allowed
to visit as much and as often as he/she wants to?”, which ignites a long discussion. Is it
egoistic or solidary to want to bring your grandchildren here and let them participate in this
beautiful island life or is it egoistic or solidary to isolate, to isolate yourself because many
people have to do it so why shouldn’t we?

Of course, the attitude towards this in our community is as diverse as we are different.
From ‘preferably no visits at all’ to ‘family reunions at Easter’, to ‘everything is ok’, to
‘everything is possible’. So no uniform regulation could be found, but we agreed on the
sentence: ‘Everyone checks for themselves whether it is really necessary to receive the visit

and then decides for themselves’.

The situation is so new for each of us that we are all constantly in the process of crysallizing
our opinions or a point of view. Some also want to consciously persevere with knowing less, in
order to listen to the deeper meaning and change that all this brings with it. Everyone
approaches the topic in their own way, whether through a lot of information from radio and
the net, in conversations with people on the spot or far away, or by tracing dreams and
images that come from within.

But we all agree that we have it good here: we live together and are not alone, we support

each other and can share worries and fears, we live in the country and can go for long and
extensive walks and all enjoy the particularly clear air and the overwhelming starry skies at
night. And we wish these experiences to as many people as possible, because we know: In
reality we are one big family – the human family.

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