CURRENT MISSION

Deepening my roots and connections in my hometown of Knoxville, Tennessee, helping to create a resilient, sustainable, compassionate and inclusive community here where a long-term localized and regenerative economy can act as a model for others around the nation and world, digging in to build a legacy of the sort of place I'd like to live in. As Wendell Berry says, "It all turns on affection" and I'm unabashed in how much I love this place, this landscape, and my family and friends who inhabit it, and who I get to do incredible things with.

ABOUT ME

Wanderer, searcher, lover of all people and all life, proud native of East Tennessee. I think I've spent my whole life searching for a Great Big Communal Love that's been broken, and I'm on a great quest to make it whole again. It hasn't always been an easy quest, but I'm trying to live in gratitude every day at the richness that I've been given by so many other people, to teach me and to guide me- everything is a great adventure.

As the great singer-songwriter Will Oldham says: "But life is long, and it's Tremendous, and we're glad you're here with us."

Namaste y'all, whoever's out there.

PHILOSOPHY

Many people are happy watching the world being made around them, and flow the best they can with whatever direction it seems to be going. But others have to work to shape and shift their universe, to make it what they want. I'm in that second group.

Why I’m on Couchsurfing

HOW I PARTICIPATE IN COUCHSURFING

I am a semi-independent adult, with a permanent "fixed" address at my parents house in Knoxville, where I grew up. What this means, is that I can not offer myself as a Surfing host for the time being.... alas- certainly look forward to hosting in the future!

COUCHSURFING EXPERIENCE

March-May 2011, Couchsurfed from the Puget Sound of Washington State (Whidbey Island) down the West Coast, and across the Rockies and ending in Madison, Wisconsin, had a glorious time meeting all kinds of wonderful people. Probably one of the more inspiring experiences of my life... and I've been lucky enough to have some contact with some inspiration in my time.

Interests

Ecovillages, Intentional Communities, What Makes people tick, Peacemaking, Conflict Resolution, Breaking down barriers, Indigenous peoples and cultures. Being a Revolutionary-at-Large, Permaculture design, all kinds of sustainable agriculture, grassroots community organizing, dissolving hierarchies, MUSIC the weirder the better especially folk music from all cultures. Storytelling, oral culture, listening to old folks and elders, listening to small children, hearing out the opposite perspective because it may have more value than you think, smiling at people. Radical education, both practice and theory. Great movies, anything mystical and prophetic. Shooting the shit with good friends, good coffee, good tea, working in the garden, watching birds be beautiful, singing in choirs, having random and unexpected discoveries. Doing Battle with Cynicism and Pessimism, and of course Babylon. Taking the road less traveled, being the odd man out, and being a ridiculously hopeful idealist because I have to be. In general, orienting myself toward the Dao and bringing more T'zu into my life. Also, I like Llanberis so much I put it on my breakfast in the morning!

• birds
• culture
• books
• singing
• design
• education
• dining
• cooking
• breakfast
• coffee
• baking
• running
• modeling
• gardening
• movies
• pottery
• knitting
• woodworking
• music
• folk music
• hunting
• surfing
• agriculture
• communications
• teaching
• history
• tourism

Music, Movies, and Books

Music favorites:

Rising Appalachia tops the list just about every time.... Edward Sharpe and the Magnetic Zeros, Gillian Welch, Sigur Ros, Ali Farka Toure, a heck of a lot of African stuff, both traditional and newer fusion, classic and new Jazz (I love chanteuses like Billie Holiday, Peggy Lee, etc.), folk/indigenous music from all cultures near and far (i.e. how different cultural Roots connect us to our own Roots, and to all life).

Movies:

"The Fountain" by Darren Aronofosky, The 'Qatsi' Trilogy by Godfrey Reggio, Baraka, The Last Wave, Together (2000), everything done by Terrence Malick, The 'Up series' documentaries. I know everybody's said it but I think Lord of the Rings still has some true mythological power to its story. Hey, and "The Color Purple" has some serious soul that touches me.

Books:

"The Phantom Tollbooth" by Norman Juster(my favorite as a young lad), "Prodigal Summer" by Barbara Kingsolver, The Tao Te Ching, The New Testament of the Bible, all the works of Wendell Berry, a lot of Appalachian literature which speaks to my homeland. Companion book to "Millenium: Tribal Wisdom for the Modern World" PBS series. If we're talking about poetry I gotsa lotsa and lotsa love for Wendell Berry's poems, Walt Whitman, Rumi, Adrienne Rich, William Blake, William Butler Yeats, Mary Oliver. Oh man, too many great ones to list. I love poetry an awful lot you see.

One Amazing Thing I’ve Done

Aaaah, hard question, there's too many to count. I think if I do some surfing and am at somebody's place, I'll be able to tell some good stories.

Teach, Learn, Share

Some knowledge I have:

Gardening and farming, medium amount of experience. Did my Permaculture Design Course in the summer of 2006. Very passionate about the whole field of Sustainable Agriculture, although I probably have more "book-learning" and theory than practical experience.

Natural Building. Did a course at The Ecovillage Training Center on The Farm in Tennessee in 2006, got quite a bit of practical experience later that year when I was contracted to build a Cob perimeter wall around my old middle school near Knoxville. I LOVE COB BUILDING!!! But strawbale, cordwood, timber-framing, adobe, all these fascinate me in a deep way. Like many other things, I would like more experience....

Community media- got some understanding of this when I interned with Alan Graf of the Third Planet Report in 2007. I did a bunch of interviews with people, and a bit of knowledge on how to run a small-scale community radio station. I am a really big fan of oral history (such as Studs Terkel) and love any opportunities I get to do more of it.

Like to learn more of:

-How to cook
-How to bake
-Yes, MORE knowledge and practice of gardening, especially Permaculture and Biodynamic techniques.
- How to knit and sow
-How to do ceramics
-Carpentry and woodworking (ironic because my Dad is highly skilled fine woodworker)

What I Can Share with Hosts

Realizing that since I first wrote this profile I finally took a big breath, got past the intimidation factor, and started Baking, which I've learned to love.

I'm a all-right baker now, no great shakes, and stuff that involves yeast is still a little past me, but I really like basic, comfort food sort of things: Cornbread, Buttermilk Biscuits, fruit pies in season, and so forth. I've found that if you use good ingredients (natural, local and organic as much as possible), things turn out pretty tasty.

So, available ingredients allowing, I offer whatever skills I have at Baking to any potential hosts in the future.... it means some good eats for all involved, and I also really enjoy the communal, down-home experience of making food together.

Countries I’ve Visited

Canada, Ghana, Grenada, Mexico, New Zealand, Sweden, United Kingdom, United States

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