Who We Are
Barely off the beaten path,
I built myself a seat:
A chair composed of stones
I found lying in the creek.
Now it’s become a kingly Throne
From which I oversee
The realm of pseudo-nature;
My favorite place to be.
I didn’t take kingship seriously. I didn’t even stop at a single article of Flintstones furniture; I ended up building a seat for my best friend next. Then, addicted to rolling boulders the size of a full grown human gone fetal, I added a three-seat couch to complete a socially optimal circle that made passing the chillum easier.
“The Thrones” will probably outlast me.
I started to think I might have built something cool when I came down to move rocks one day and there was a different group of stoners lounging at the spot and passing around a footlong bong.
That was a decade ago. I moved back to that suburb recently and decided to check on the “realm of pseudo-nature.” It turned out someone else is now maintaining them—even making improvements.
That’s what being a Creekmason is about: finding a small, disregarded corner of the world, making it a little better and yielding ownership to whoever needs a place of escape next. It’s about finding a liminal space amidst attitudes exemplified by sober, domesticated, suburban lawns and experiencing a moment of disconnection from what Douglass Rushkoff calls “the machine.”
A moment of peace.
Look for moments of connection with the others who use the spot, both with you and while you aren’t there. Others who you’ve made a hair more comfortable by moving a stone.
And that’s all it takes to become initiated into the Creekmasons: you have to move one rock with the intention to improve your surroundings.
If you don’t have a creek handy, your rock can be anything. Maybe you pre-bus your plates at a restaurant by stacking them at the end of the table. You might push not just your cart to its corral, but another curbed thoughtlessly in the grocery store parking lot. You could simply contribute to an atmosphere of compassion and acceptance in an online space drifting toward vitriol.
This is your home if you’re feeling disenfranchised, disillusioned and despairing while watching the culture war from the sidelines.
Do you feel like the only one who sees how we all fit together?
You’re welcome here if you’re someone interested in an idealistic Big Picture but turned off by your allies’ demonization of your supposed ideological opponents.
You belong here if you’re hungry to discuss relationships, religion, politics, societal issues and current events without being shouted down for displaying compassion toward the elements of every side that represent a good faith grievance with the status quo. Every Creekmason knows the keen sting of loneliness that comes from embodying a polygnostic mindset defined as believing, simultaneously, that every view, belief and person has value.
The Creekmason ethos dictates that it matters less what you believe, and more how you interact with others who exhibit differences in opinion. The writing here is for people from all directions on all spectrums, but, sort of like Al-Anon, it seeks to fill a need for a “support group” for those who’ve lost a loved one to addictive algorithm-driven radicalization and is meant to be a place where true radical inclusion can thrive.
Accordingly, the extent of my personal mission is simple: to make at least one person feel a little less alone.
Lift up anything heavy; find a way to make a stranger more comfortable.
Let’s build something better, together.
Geoff Gallinger writes poems, essays and fiction and has said a time or two that a Bachelor’s in Creative Writing from SF State qualifies them perfectly for being a pizza driver. That sounds like self-deprecation, but hours a day completely alone in a beater car with an audiobook and a notepad for company are actually a good approximation of a “room of one’s own.”
Being home isn’t too bad either; their daughter and wife will always be their primary audience.