On Being A Tour Guide

This week, or weekend, I became a "certified" tour guide for Arcosanti (I put that in quotes only because there's no certificate—it's just official, that's all). Tour guides usually get paid quite well for giving tours, but because I'm a workshopper and not a resident, I'm doing it as volunteer work. I offered to do it mostly because they were short on guides and I thought I'd enjoy the work—which I do. But after the workshop I will start to get paid for it.

Having led two tours so far, I more or less have my basic tour down, with fine tweaks to be done here and there. It is very enjoyable work. I'm not a social person that way—in the sense that I am good at public speaking, dealing with crowds, or—well, being a tour guide. But this is an exception to the rule. Not only do I know a lot about Arcosanti from years (literally) of studying it from afar, but my depth of knowledge about Soleri, his theories, and my passion for the place itself gives me an edge. Similarly, I enjoy telling people about this place. It's always a new thing for someone. Even though it all becomes commonplace for you once you start living here—like anything would for a given period of time—for these visitors it is all new, exciting, and grand. Sometimes weird, and you have to console them out of their weird assumptions. I've been told we get "crazies" during the summer months. I'm not quite sure how I'm going to deal with the people looking for free sex and beer, nor those who have an automatic assumption that Arcosanti is the home for some sort of strange bloodletting cult (I'm almost tempted to lead them on in the latter case). But those are the exceptions. Most people who come here simply don't know what to expect, and it is such a radical shift from what they may know otherwise, they're so surprised from the start that they don't have any expectations.

Beyond that, I also feel it will be good for me. It allows me to get outside the bubble a bit—remind me of the fact that other people exist outside of Arcosanti. The community here is extremely small for containing all the aspects and activities of a normal "urban" lifestyle. Thus I am reminded each time of both the uniqueness and the rarity of this place when people visit and don't know anything about it. And it is a bit of a returning, as originally it was going on a tour that gave me the first and lasting impression of Arcosanti—and in a distant way, I am here because of that tour.

So it is an interesting break and change of pace, if anything. And it is yet another personally expanding experience, at best. With the perk of some extra funds, once the workshop is over.

Shovel Sand, Carry Stone

This week has been the most physically exhausting week I have had in a long time. The workshop was put into construction work almost uniformly, and so our schedule consisted of going to work at 7:00 AM with pickaxes and shovels in hand. Thankfully they let us go early, typically around 2:30. But I have both gotten a tan thanks to this and probably gained a little bit of weight (in muscle, of course).

Regardless of the amount of work or the intensity of it, especially on Monday or Tuesday, I deeply enjoyed all of it. We worked near the site for La Loggia, what will eventually be a four story lodging complex—but the pool on the nearby cliff needed to be shored up first. The nature of construction here is confusing at times, even haphazard. This is due to the fact that Arcosanti was created almost by sheer force of volunteers over the decades. But because it's gone through so many design changes, there are no solidified "blueprints" for the site. Things that have to be fixed may have confusing or even nonexistent records of what work went on, where. So when we had to find the concrete footing for the pool, for example, we had to dig for it. No one at Arcosanti presently remembered where it was originally poured.

That said, I have no complaints about it. It's simply the nature of the site, and it adds to its uniqueness. As for myself though, working with a shovel and pickaxe, the labor of excavation was also part of the process of learning. The Zen masters had a saying: if you wanted to know the secret of Zen, you should chop wood and carry water.

That simple saying got me through most of the hours. Only a day ago I had been chopping carrots and cleaning celery for dinner, and I had applied the saying then. The secret of Zen is finding the peace, the contentment, in the monotonous and the simple. So when the chopping knife turned into a shovel, the same proverb was applied, except with just some extra force. And instead of chopping wood and carrying water, it was shoveling dirt and carrying boulders.

We didn't work only at the pool though, which will be an ongoing project. We did get to see some immediate fruits of our labor down at Camp (a small residency site at the bottom of the Arcosanti Mesa).



This is an experimental greenhouse. It looks nice now, but only because we had shoveled sand into the troughs up the stairs, which were sifted from the pure dirt excavated a truck drive away. I've never sweat so much in my life. Not only was it beginning to feel like Arizona weather that day, but we were in a greenhouse of all things, shoveling dirt upwards. And there was a lot of it. In the thick of it, it was a mess, it was dusty, and when I took the shower to get the dirt off, I literally watched the dust become mud and roll off my arms. But we got it done and it was planted the next day.

And the work was worth it. Do not be fooled by the small size of the greenhouse—it is only a prototype for data gathering. This greenhouse is a miniature version of the Energy Apron, or a massive greenhouse that will run like a slanted river across the Mesa bluffs below Arcosanti proper. Its tiered structure allows for various microclimates to form, with varying temperatures on the way up. On a large enough scale, you would be able to grow enough food for export, year round, with everything from spinach to sunflowers. Aquariums could even be added on the supporting columns that would hold the transparent roof, allowing enriched water to feed the plants, and to get a crop of sea-dwelling life as well.

There is a big push in Arcosanti to get the Energy Apron completed, however small the steps towards such a huge project are or may seem. To me, the greenhouse is possibly the biggest bottleneck for Arcosanti right now. Arcosanti does not aim to be self-sufficient (i.e. secluded from the rest of the world), but it does want to be self-reliant and to be both an example for and trading partner with the surround towns. The greenhouse would draw attention as an agricultural center, making food a prime export and industry of this place. Arcosanti is already successful in agriculture with what it has. But in my opinion it has so much potential. With a system like an Energy Apron, this place could supply valuable crops year-round to restaurants in the Phoenix and Scottsdale area, without the massive logistical costs. I hear Arcosanti supplies the basil for a large number of Italian restaurants in the area for this very fact—and also the fact they can supply a lot of it in very fresh supply.

As the week ends though, my duties will probably shift to the graphic design side of things, which I am excited about. I'm excited about the possibility of being able to help shape the visual identity of this place. It is something of a dream come true, really. But I value the other experiences just as highly, as I know that they are just as valuable for me and the community here as well. And they are valuable personal lessons. There is a spartan quality to the life here that I enjoy. Or semi-spartan, really—wine and beer is in abundance, and much fun is had by all on Friday and Saturday nights (just ask about the "Avalanche Bar"—it involves alcohol, of course, and cliff-side construction sites, to give you an idea). It's interesting to note that the truly enjoyable aspects of life are enjoyable only when they are utilized in tandem with the hard, laborious aspects of life. The Taoist philosophy of the balance of opposites comes to mind: both aspects, in a whole, create each other, and one cannot exist without the other.

But compared to my life back "home," the simple, modest quality of life here is attractive. And not because it is romantic, but because it is realistic. And that fact is somehow nurturing.



One of the peacocks showing off down at Camp.



Riding on the back of a solar-powered golfcart with Darina and Erin (the sign on the front, not shown in the picture, says "no golfing permitted).

Picture Time #4 - Nature Hike

Roger, who has been with Arcosanti since "the beginning" as he describes it, has an absolute wealth of knowledge about the geography, nature, and prehistory of the area around Arcosanti, aside from having an encyclopediac knowledge of other topics too. He treated us to an extended hike around the mesas surrounding the site.



Stephan and his camera.



Roger explaining the Agua Fria river valley, just beyond the ledge.




Cottonwood trees. These are really interesting—they're essentially cotton plants in tree form. It's quite amazing—with a gust of wind cotton pieces will float through the hot landscape like snowflakes.



The Mesa (it's breathtaking in person).



I like this particular shot—an old chevy that was at an abandonned ranch at the bottom of the hill.




Roger on top of the Mesa.




Arizona thistle.



In the middle of an ancient Native American pueblo.



After a hike that just about lasted the whole day, the long trek across the top of the Mesa, covered in grass. Off in the distance, Arcosanti (you can always tell by the freestanding Cyprus trees). The area is a true wilderness.

Picture Time #3 - Housing Tour

This time we got to invade the residencies at Arcosanti to get a peek at how everything looks on the inside. Needless to say, it is just as interesting on the inside as it is the outside.

A view of the outside sections of Arcosanti (otherwise known as the Arizona desert).



Detail work in concrete.





The Vaults from the outside.



My ideal bedroom (it's funny, but it's true).




Stephan keeping watch over us for his future documentary.





Laurence and Frederic looking out the windows of Dave's apartment, which surrounds the Foundry.

Picture Time #2 - Ceramics and Foundry Demonstration

The staff at Arcosanti were kind enough to stop their workday and give in-depth demonstrations and explanations for the bell-making processes, both ceramic and bronze-cast. Here are the pictures that pretty much record that.





Demonstrating the silt-cast method (slip is poured into a mold made out of river silt, or very fine sand, to create a one-shot form without any handbuilding or wheel throwing).




The kiln. The ceramicists here actually fire their pieces straight from greenware to full bells, even if glaze is applied. I had never known this was even possible, much less it being done. They've certainly gotten their bell-making process down to a science.



Unfired bells.




Plaster molds.



Then, onto the Foundry. I think this is one of the coolest places at Arcosanti.



Jim showing us the aluminum molds.




Unassembled bronze bells.



Bronze tiles.



Molds awaiting the bronze. The molten bronze is poured into a very fine quartz dust, which takes the shape of the aluminum molds.




Compressing the quartz dust.



Before pouring designs are added to the interior of the molds, which leave relief impressions. We were actually allowed to create our own impressions in the bells. Here is Gen working on his variation.



Where the bronze melts.



Clearing out the sprues for the molds (the place where the metal flows in).



Finally, the bronze is ready.




Pouring.





The bells cool and then busted out of the molds. The sprues are cut off and recycled as scrap bronze for the next firing, and the bells eventually get assembled.