I just reposted a blog and I could not add my story to it for some reason, but I thought you might be interested in finding out more about my history.

My journey with learning about intentional communities from the Intentional Communities Directory started around 1976 when I moved to Arkansas Ozarks with Cliff Mikkelson, now my dear friend and former husband. We moved to Arkansas from San Diego, California, because Cliff had friends–Bryan and Sue Sharp–who had moved to Arkansas to start an organic blueberry farm. They asked him to come and help in exchange for living in a 16 x 8 foot trailer that was completely off grid with no electricity or running water. When he asked if I could come along, they said yes, and I said yes!

I met Cliff at the Garden of Eden at San Diego State University after I had returned from a transformative 13 month solo trip with just a backpack. You can learn some of my story here where I started to copy my book, Travels to the East, onto a blog. Even though I did not believe in God, I believe that God believed in me, and thus he told me that I needed to get out of the United States and travel. I obeyed the God I did not believe in, and a year later was on a plane to Paris, and eventually traveling overland from Germany on the Orient Express train to Instanbul, Turkey.

I spent most of my time in Afganistan, Pakistan, India, Sri Lanka and Iran–in that order. When I left the United States, my philosophy was “if it feels good, do it.” I still remember when a friend asked me if she should have sex with her boyfriend, that is what I said. I was promiscuous, cheated on my boyfriend, had an affair with a married professor (double cheating!) and totally immoral. This was a huge change from how I lived up until my college years where the influences and temptations led me down a destructive path.
On the plane trip back from my mostly grueling experience where I was searching for what I called “my niche”, I had a revelation. I distinctly sensed the message, “The only way you will be happy is if you use your gifts and serve others.” This was way before I read the book, “Do what you love and the rest will follow.” Also, service was an essential part of the message.

Within 3 weeks of returning to the United States, I found my way to the Garden of Eden at San Diego State University where I met Cliff Mikkelson. It was definitely not love at first sight. I was tired of sexual encounters that led nowhere, and I was open to just being friends. But we did fall in love and got married 6 months later, and very soon after that moved to Arkansas.

We spent a year working for Bryan and Sue Sharp, who is now Sue Nuffer. We often went to the Armstead commune mentioned in the previous article, and I have such good memories of making music, homemade ice cream and skinny dipping in their pond. They were true homesteaders!

Cliff and I worked hard, and we were living by the law of giving and receiving. We paid for our own food mostly, and we were gifted $30 a month by Quincy John Workman who was the wonderful man responsible for building the Garden of Eden. Read more about Quincy John here. He also helped Cliff wake up to the conspiracy facts that many people are waking up to increasingly especially since Covid hit. And Cliff red-pilled me. What a gift!

The blueberries hadn’t even been planted when we arrived. We spent countless hours doing things like shoveling saw dust (blueberries actually like sawdust as mulch), digging post holes for fencing, cleaning out the blackberry briers, and working in the garden. Our pay was good fellowship (we were all in Self Realization Fellowship at the time), invites to places like the Armstead gatherings, being able to jump in their pond in the freezing winter cold (we knew about cold therapy before Wim Hof came along), and tagging along to snag rejected watermelons in fields where we had permission to glean .
We had our own gardens, lived without refrigeration or electricity, and hitchhiked when we needed rides. In so many ways, it was paradise.

After a year, we were invited to help caretake the Whole Earth Foods Co-op building which served a very large part of the rural area around Chimes, where the co-op building was located. For two years we published the newsletter that had the order sheet for the co-op, coordinated the monthly food distribution, and hosted gatherings at the co-op building. Also very fulfilling in so many ways, we now had a whopping $100 allowance each month, electricity, running water and refrigeration! What luxury. I still remember the thrill of being able to take calls for the local midwife who had no phone. I would run to her house to tell her about the upcoming birth, and gratitude was forthcoming.

Living by the law of giving and receiving, never working directly for money but receiving gifts of money, was so fulfilling. But Cliff and I sensed we needed to move back to California for more lessons, so we hitchhiked back (which we had done about 6 times) and started a new life where we had paying jobs. What a change. But we did have many things to learn which led to us divorcing but never giving up our friendship. Having a child, Chris, with Cliff, was very wonderful. And then when we moved to Arkansas again with Robert, my new husband, we eventually all were able to buy land together. Cliff now owns 9 acres, and I own 18 acres, where the Wilberforce Village site is located. How I long for the day when I say, “the community owns the land together!” But we need to start somewhere, right?
I forgot to say that when Cliff, Robert and I decided it was time to leave California in 1991 because rent was going through the roof and we saw trends we were not happy with, I contacted Sue Nuffer and asked if she knew anyone we could trade labor for rent. She almost immediately responded via post card with the name and number of friends who were starting a blueberry farm. And that is how we ended up coming back to Arkansas. The wild ride which led us to a Christian community and being able to buy is yet another beautiful story of God’s grace.

After thought:

I found this in my resume, and this gives a little more of the story in case you are interested:

1977-1980  Co-coordinated one of the first whole foods co-ops in Arkansas. My husband (now former husband, present friend) and I did everything except transport the food. Duties included: publishing a monthly newsletter; collating orders; making the order; coordinating volunteers; taking care of the money; coordinating re-packaging of the food. There were a lot of details, and it was a good learning experience. We also encouraged people to have gatherings, and were active in the community, including hosting various community gatherings ourselves.

1981-1983 Returned to Southern California because our dreams of founding an intentional community were not happening.  I floundered for a while, doing many odd jobs including house painting, selling crystals, working for a few health food stores, trying out being commission only employment agency, and even one day worked for 7/11 Speedymart. I wanted to work at a job I loved, but just could not figure out how to do it. I did temporary secretarial work, where I learned much about typing, word processing, and details about running businesses. I also learned I never wanted to have a permanent job working for a big business that just saw me as a cog in the wheel.

I  started my own business, “Meals on Moped”, where I made food to order for my customers, and delivered it on my moped plus custom made trailer.

I was passionate about getting people to sing together–first at Christmas, then wanting them to do so all year–why sing just at Christmas, especially going to convalescent hospitals where they were flooded with carolers during a small time of year, then no visitors the rest of the year. All of my spare time was spent making a song book with chords and a song book without chords–so people could easily have sing alongs.

1981-83 M