(para leer el texto en castellano: https://puyuelo.org/querids-amigs/)
Queridos amigos,
As always, I have to start this letter with the usual apology that there has been so much time between the last edition and this one. This time, however, that is not due to the fact that we have been so busy that I could not find the time. No. Although the last edition might have been the most hopeful one I have written so far – I told you we were looking for new people and wanted to open new chapters in Puyuelo – things changed in autumn. Rather unexpectedly, our group got confronted with a crisis, a structural and interpersonal conflict between us that escalated and confronted us with a serious challenge.
By now I know a project like this one comes in waves. Like life itself, things are in a constant flux. That also means that this letter is an image of today, one that might look very different again in a couple of months. However, I did feel like writing it now. Partially because I want the image we project to be honest, in good and bad times. For too long I have approached the story of Puyuelo as one that should be the successful rise of a young community. I try to step away from that story, to open up for the huge value of what it really is, even if it is only a chapter in our lives. Above that I believe all of you who carry a warm heart for Puyuelo can help us. Whether by merely sending us some good energy, listening to one of us, reading this letter and doing something with it in your own community, I don’t know. I am ever more convinced we all work in something like an overarching socio-cultural field, way too complex to grasp, difficult to put in words, yet I feel every little stone we move, might have a lot more consequences than the ones we usually see.
There is a theory on communal living that sees a group as some kind of self regulating organism, an organism that will always create conflict as a means to evolve to the next stage. Let’s say something is not working well, conflict arises and is ideally taken as an invitation to look at what’s wrong and collectively look for a way out. Ideally, in any conflict, a group manages to stay calm and asks ‘What does this conflict come to tell us?’ That is the theory. Yet often, when you are in the middle of it, it gets damned confusing and lots of work and energy (both individual and collective) are needed to seek for a way out. For me personally, during the first half of winter, it brought me into some kind of schizophrenic state. On the one hand I was enjoying my personal life a lot as many things were happening at the same time. On the other hand our group was in trouble and that felt like a black cloud above everything. I won’t go into details. That is our dirty laundry and you’d only get my version anyway. What I can do is give you a bit of an image of the structural story I read in all this.
The other day while laying awake in bed, I tried to picture our endeavour as a car ride. We got in, knowing where the gas pedal and the steering wheel were. After all we were four men in the beginning, shaped and formed in a patriarchal society, at the time convinced that mere talking and physical work (the steering wheel and the gas pedal) would propel us towards our utopian dreams. Initially we did not find consensus on what we exactly wanted to be and definitely did not agree on the way to go there. The society we grew up in was all about gas pedals and steering wheels. About going forward, fast and effectively. Talking and working is what governs any company or association, isn’t it? In many ways that did work out. We have made great progress and can be proud of ourselves. But yes, we are no hierarchal organization. We don’t have such an easy and clear objective as many companies do. Our goals are not linear, neither are our individual lives.
Let’s go back to the car. Picture us not wearing a seatbelt. One of the wheels is missing. Discussion arises which one of us is the best driver and if that should be an argument at all. The road is full of potholes and unforeseen obstacles (the path of doing something different than what society dictates is obviously not paved with brand new tarmac). Nobody knows which address to put in the GPS. We forgot to refill the oil level before departure. And there we go, like a rolling ball of chaos, hoping we’ll reach a peaceful end. That metaphor was coined by Felix and wonderfully put into drawing by Moritz as you see here below. Among the way, as we bumped heads against the ceiling or were sometimes even flung full front against the window – we learned at least some things. We found the seatbelts and became better in avoiding the biggest potholes. In some aspects we found out that, if you don’t change yourself consciously, it is highly likely you reproduce what your culture wired you for. It became ever more clear we have five different people on board. Five people with their individual traumas, shortcomings, strengths, shadows, moodswings, dreams and desires. On top of that those people change along the ride. Ideas come and go, characters are refined, relations rise and fall.
I am personally ever more convinced that what happened to us over the past months is that we increasingly become aware of the madness of this ride, of the necessity of taking this way more serious than we initially thought. To live and work together sustainably for a long time, seems to require proactive psychological, emotional and rational work. Reasonable meetings and hard work alone won’t do. What might do is a toolset of communal work way broader than what we have used so far. The last weeks we started experimenting with different formats. Active listening, meetings focused on our emotional reality, facilitation sessions with professionals: careful endeavors into a more holistic way of maintaining our social balance. Unfortunately, we have been in that car for five years in a quite reckless way. There is bruises, old wounds, fatigue, petty conflicts to be dealt with. And honestly this is my view, I am not sure if there is consensus on that or if everybody would feel like doing all that effort. The coming weeks and months we confront the difficult task of building out our vehicle to something more solid, to possibly change its direction and at the same time somehow come to terms with the ghosts of the past.
I am pretty sure many of you ask themselves the question why one would be so crazy to embark onto such a tiring and complicated journey? Especially if society offers you a shiny Tesla and kilometers of perfectly maintained highways? Many times when I explain people about our difficulties, they sigh, look at me and say something like “I have tried living with people but it is impossible”. I see where that deception comes from. Personally I hope never to arrive at that point and, if I do, at least never to project it on young people, since to me, one of the biggest challenges of humanity, is to learn to live together again. Even if some projects fail and end prematurely, we are working out part of that puzzle: how, in the 21st century, with individuals raised in this culture, with the financial power to stand on their own legs, do we manage to build something collective again? How do we form a resilient structure, based on self-sufficiency, on mutual aid, on a respectful relation to our environment?
We have lived like this for centuries in very different conditions. And although I am convinced that was no joy ride either, life on the ground in Puyuelo has taught me that we have lost things that are hard to imagine for us modern people. A relation to the land you live on, a feeling of belonging, of mutual support, an existence rooted in ritual and tradition, a life along the seasons or close to other animals, living together with the wisdom of the elders, of shamans or witches. We might be children of the comfortable Tesla society, yes, but also of a society where things like loneliness, burn-out, natural destruction or extreme inequality are reaching unprecedented levels.Anyhow. If you don’t ask yourself the question why you would do something so complicated and demanding, I can promise you all of us regularly have to deal with that question ourselves. And that is not always simple.
So far, however, I have seen myself time and time again driven back to the strong belief that it’s all more than worth the time and effort. Now, at the end of winter, I stand strong again in optimism and hope. I look at the state of the world and feel that my path lays here, in that long and tiresome struggle. That feeling will leave me again during certain periods, sure, but what I hope is that I’ll always find my way back to it. That I never end up at a point of irreversible cynicism. That seems like a proper challenge indeed, as the older we get, the world seems bigger and more unchangeable, and our personal lives seem to grow more and more insignificant. At least if we only look at the direct effects. In silence I have come to call that ‘the narrative leap’, our personal responsibility to construct a story around our life that keeps us close to what I see as my main allies: trust, hope, curiosity, playfulness, humor: the powers of LIFE.
Here is a little overview of the main pillars I lean on (I realize I partially write them down as a reminder for myself).
– The feeling of community I always get back. This year James and I celebrated new year’s eve with some of our best friends Seba, Marieke, Saco and Ingel, in France. For a moment I wondered why I wouldn’t live with them. Isn’t everything wonderfully easy? Soon though, I recognized that what I feel for my friends in Puyuelo is by now something very special, something that lays between friends and family. We have swam through so many difficult and beautiful waters. We have all seen each other’s shadow and light. That gives me both a deep sense of belonging and a feeling of being backed up by great people. If that is something like community, than lately, notwithstanding the hard times, I often felt grateful to have found that. More so, I am by now convinced that any group of people, even if best friends, will see friction arise at one point. None of us is perfect. A long co-existence makes it impossible not to confront our individual shadows. What you get back is something incredibly beautiful, but it will always require effort to keep it up.
– Because of the state of the world. Ever since we came here things seem to become more and more frightening. War, rising right wing governments, climate madness, a long list of evolutions that makes me fear our collective future is increasingly unpredictable. To me, self-governance on a small scale is a powerful answer to what I see outside. I believe in empowered people. People that understand and relate to their immediate surroundings. People that feel they have a hold over the down-to-earth course of their life. People that build dynamic relationships between them, thus endlessly challenging their personal and collective status quo.
– Because I am ever more convinced the core family, an invention of the last 150 years, is not the one and only viable model to live in. More so, it is mostly the one that fits best to the current economic system, not to the human condition in general. Two people, one house and its mortgage, individualized material goods and services.
“Capitalism and patriarchy together, as structures of domination, have worked overtime to undermine and destroy this larger unit of extended kin. Replacing the family community with a more privatized small autocratic unit helped increase alienation and made abuses of power more possible. It gave absolute rule to the father, and secondary rule over children to the mother. By encouraging the segregation of nuclear families from the extended family, women were forced to become more dependent on an individual man, and children more dependent on an individual woman. It is this dependency that became, and is, the breeding ground for abuses of power.” (Bell Hooks – All about love)
– Because of what we have managed to create already. This is a fucking beautiful place, we all enjoy life here to the fullest and grow in our own way in the directions we like. There is at this point still a big gap between our back end (structural problem) and front end (daily life here, the visitors, the friendship and goodwill we still feel). I am by now convinced Puyuelo will exist for at least a couple of decades more, with or without us, and see it as a great chance to create the foundation it will stand on, for us or for the people that will follow. This place has a potential that keeps on humbling me, and I think we have so far only managed to materialize a fraction of it.
Well. So far the heavy, preachy part of this letter. I hope to be able to bring you some more humor in the next edition. Let me end with a little overview of what any of us has been doing, for good old gossip’s sake.
This winter, as usual, we scaled down public life in Puyuelo and retreated into our more personal endeavors.
Somewhere in the beginning of winter, Moritz got a pottery wheel from Felix. Ever since, with his usual dedication to crafts, the man has been spinning his wheel and improving his skills. More than once I have seen him sitting outside on his porch just after dusk, temperatures close to freezing, his hands in cold clay or water. Mid January he left to Morocco with a friend, right now he is in Germany visiting friends and family.
Aly finished her room, spent the holidays with friends in France and then came back to Puyuelo. One day I saw a clumsily built wooden plate in the corner of her living room. When I asked her what it was, she snapped that I was, ‘as usual’, too curious, and that it was to become a table. The next day a stunning, hand painted map of Puyuelo appeared on that same wooden board on the village square. I guess you get the picture: behind closed doors she must be creating all kinds of artistic wonders. As usual we get to see little of that and if she wasn’t vegetarian I am sure she would gladly have curious bastards like me for breakfast. May that be a warning for all of you curious people who managed to get this far in this news letter.
Felix disappeared to his favorite planet: Zork, where he writes and thinks in the company of a group of controversial complot theorists and psychonauts. His new soundtrack, antifascist German rock music, keeps away most living creatures blessed with a hearing apparatus, so he gets both solitude and inspiration (when Laura is with him, she forces him to listen with headphones). The other day I got to read the first draft of his latest essay. A 40 page analysis of the state and the economy that made me feel like sparking up revolutionary projects again this year. A must read for anyone who wants to move to a middle-of-nowhere muddy hill and feel like that was the absolute right thing to do in the early 21st century.
James and Ella recovered from the big construction site by becoming crossword champions of Puyuelo on many a cold winter morning. After my 12-1 Scrabble victory during the winter of 2023, I had to face the dreadful fact that Mr. Sweetlove seems to have improved quite some and beat my ass big time during the last two games we played. This summer they have the plan to go to Switzerland and work as shepherds in the Alps.
I myself have been face to face with my novel again. As usual, I float from complete agony (“this is all crap and it will never be published”) to psychopathic megalomania (“I am the most important writer of the Iberian peninsula and aim for nothing less than the Pullitzer price for best debut novel”). Usually that back and forth movement happens at a staggering rate of 700 oscillations per week. I guess you understand why I decided to take another Vipassana meditation course in January to somehow keep up Buddhist equanimity in this creative storm. As usual ten days of silence brought me a lot of inspiration, and this time I cheated on one rule by smuggling in a small notebook. During the course I sneaked it into the toilet tree times to quickly scribble down some things. The past months, regular visits from Lisa also helped to keep myself sane and healthy.
Concerning the future, notwithstanding the trouble, this year has all the ingredients to become an interesting one. We are all more or less comfortably installed and want to take on some common projects. Among other things on our wish list: a washing machine (Finally! Revolution!), a serious makeover of the common house, a warm water system, bigger and better gardens.. This summer we also celebrate the fifth anniversary of our project. Therefore, on the 12th of July, we have the honour to receive La Ronda de Boltaña, the famous traditional musical band of our province that sings about the abandoned villages and the beauty of the Pyrenees. No doubt that will be a beautiful and special day. Come and celebrate with us if you like.
So. As this accidently turned into a biyearly news letter, I feel a little less guilty to have thrown five heavy pages to you. I hope all of you are doing well in your respective life projects. Think about us once in a while when you are reminded of Puyuelo and, as always, feel free to come by this year. Things are still great on the ground. I am sure all of us will do what we can to try to keep on standing with the birth process of the next chapter, whatever it may look like.
Lots of love,
Pablo, Aly, James, Felix and Moritz.
Puyuelo, March 2025