Commune with the Community
by Fred Aiken
This question seems intentionally vague and a bit misleading. I assume it’s suggesting what one does in the capacity of a volunteer in the community, but I suppose I’d have to ask what community? This being a globalized, post-industrial, age-of-the-internet sort of world we live in, community could certainly mean quite a few things.
In terms of my local community, not much. I don’t really volunteer all that much. Though I will occasionally give blood. In a non-volunteer capacity, I interact and am involved in my local community on a daily basis. Unless one has agoraphobia, I imagine it would be fairly difficult to not be involved with one’s local community in some capacity. I go to local farmer’s markets, dine at local restaurants, maintain a nice relationship with my neighbors, and, I suppose most importantly of all, I pay my local taxes. Sales tax, state tax, property tax. There are probably a few others. But I do feel like those count as involvement with one’s community in some capacity.
Though perhaps I’m just trying to make excuses for myself for my lack of involvement as a volunteer for my community.
In terms of an internet community, the only social media I have is WordPress, and that involvement mostly revolves around reading others’ posts. Commenting, liking, giving others small serotonin boosts with tacit forms of approval. Which isn’t to say I’m trying to denigrate such a practice. I think finding your people, even when it’s on a digital platform, is always an important part of life.
I suppose, now that I think of it, I do interact and have involvement with other internet communities. Mostly when it comes to coffee. There’s the Roaster’s Guild community that I interact with, either by contributing data and information about my own experience roasting, or going to the yearly Roasting Retreat that the guild hosts all over the country. And then there’s the Specialty Coffee Association (SCA), that I’ve been involved with for quite some time. I’ve garnered quite a few certifications by attending various courses to learn more about the field.
There are certain communities I do wish I was more involved with. There’s the writing community, though I suppose that community is kinda spread out and difficult to fully define. In fact, one might even say that participating and being involved on WordPress is a form of involvement with a certain segment, a rather large segment, of the writing community. So, yeah, maybe I am as involved as I need to be with regards to the writing community.
There are probably a few other communities and social activities that I’m involved in that I haven’t really thought about. There was a time when I considered myself misanthropic and antisocial. In fact, as a teenager I was even diagnosed with antisocial personality disorder. But that was also at a time in which I romanticized Dostoevsky’s and Hemingway’s respective mental illnesses. I also listened to a lot of punk rock back then, too. In fact, I still do. Though I wouldn’t go so far as to make the Tipper Gore argument that the music made me antisocial. With time and perspective, and quite a few grey hairs, like more grey hairs than I thought I would have in my mid-thirties, I realize that I felt out of place. I didn’t have much of a community.
Nowadays, given some thought, I would say I have quite a few different communities. Some of which I interact with minimally. But most of which I have some form of involvement pretty frequently. I’m also kinda looking forward to the future communities that I more than likely will be a part of. Like the old man community, where I get to complain about my hip while drinking prune juice all the time. And maybe I’ll join a few communities that I don’t even realize I wanted to be part of but I just sort of fell into them. Who knows. There’s a lot of people out there. So I wouldn’t put it past coming across one or two of them at some point.
Fred Aiken Writing 