cleo creech

There’s an old saying that comes to mind, about how nothing dates faster than one’s vision of the future. That seems true for Arcosanti. Though it manages to feel classic, new, and stuck in the 70s all at the same time. The master plan (there have been many) has a city built on a grand scale, where thousands of people would live and work, yet they seem happy being a small eclectic community. I overhead the morning staff meeting, and they seemed more concerned about keeping construction dust out of the cereal bins than working towards world peace. That seems an apt metaphor though, cause even in the course of working on the big picture, the devil is in the details. This place feels isolated and insular, yet the place is full of international students. It’s a lot to take in, with it’s contradictions and complexities. I’m just here a day though so am going for a crash course.

They don’t like the word “visionary” used, though that’s the reason I came here, and there didn’t seem to be another word that applied. It was hard to pin down the plans for the future and expanding their mission beyond what seems at times to be a dogmatic following of Paolo Solieri’s teachings. Another way in which they seem to be stuck in time. They’ve just celebrated his 90th birthday, and it seems the only place that rates AC is his archives.

There is the perception that this is a sort of hippie commune, that the place has some mystical or spiritual energy, yet they like to like to promote themselves as more a practical laboratory for a better way of life. The hippie commune image to shake though when you have four types of granola on the breakfast bar, as well as both soy and rice milk.

Things seem pretty simple here. They’re fairly insulated from the main economy here and strive for self-sufficiency. Though I have to wonder how many sets of $80 brass wind bells they can be selling these days.

My main question though seemed to go unanswered. What is the purpose of the visionary, the dreamer, in these tough times. It seems this place was founded to answer that question, but the approach seems to be “well we’re going to sit up in the mountains and work on it, we’ll get back to you.”

Then the answer did present itself. In a rather unexpected surprising way. Though it seems the way the universe works. The guest rooms only had me and one other resident. And since part of the brochure speak of “embracing a holistic approach to energy needs” means no AC. I found myself sitting out on the little landing in my plastic patio chair, overlooking the little valley Arcosanti sits over.

The other resident, a 30ish young lady comes over and pulls up a chair.

What followed was a near two hour conversation, about our histories, journeys and what we were looking for in life. Seems I had an awful lot in common with this lesbian theology student. We were both questioning where we were in life, looking for answers, trying to figure things out.

This was why I came to Arcosanti, that is the purpose of the visionary of the dreamer. To pull people together, to explore, to ask big questions. That two hours sitting in the dark, overlooking the desert, under a milk way sky. Those are the moments that help define us all and make a real difference.