fatvegan

Henrietta isn't a real person - but she could be. Millions of families, every year, (someone of them probably with mums called Henrietta) pick up and move on, for no reason better than They'd Best Be Going. It's bad enough when you're at someone's house, the clock strikes 9pm, and you start to feel like you've stayed too long. Why has time, as community glass ceiling become so prevalent? We'll be examining this and other fascinating sorts of issues in the paragraphs to come.

Like many things, it's easy to call it another one of life's unexplained idiosyncracies, and get in the station wagon. But is that good enough? This person doesn't think so.

Koko Yama, is a woman I found amongst the growing ranks of people dissatisified with the current community paradigm. She claims that "Children need a stable home." She didn't explain why, so we'll just have to take her word for it. "And what has happened that removes the need for long term community," she continues, "have we suddenly become content to exist as autonomous entities simply because the individual has managed to secure itself a voice." When asked what she thought the way forward was, Koko replied "More public funding of community programs, and more emphasis on building awareness in the community of the value community brings." Some people would suggest that the sacrifices involved are too great, and that given our quality of life, there's no longer any need to band together. Why can't communities simply form when and where they need to. Why do they need to be permanent, and with a particular group of people "They just do, OK," was the, now familiar, response from Koko.

As for Henrietta, and the family she's hypothetically struggling to raise, in, what some are calling, The Age of the Nuclear Family (as in fission, not fusion) - where does this all leave her. Out in the cold? Or merely another contented Land Rover owner, in a community, that's not longer even sure it should being calling itself this.