Coin Laundry, the laundromat on the main street of New Denver, closed its doors right after Labor Day, after 17 years. The business had been up for sale for some time. I was interested: I had thought, when I first came to live in the village, 32 years ago, that the laundromat would be a good gig . 
     The owner did not respond affirmatively to the letter I'd handed her in response to one she'd given me. My letter detailed my main concerns about the lack of exact financial accounting on the statement she'd given me. Her figures - or rather, the absence of figures one expects to find on a business-for-sale account statement - had made her suggested buyout price hard for me to agree to. It might or might not have been reasonable; but money's been tight and I wanted to be sure...
     Only: How could the village have no place for people at large to wash their clothes, no place to congregate around laundry? Not!
     A few days after the laundry's doors were locked, I got an answer to my request for a more complete financial report. The answer was: Ixnay to negotiation. In fact, the response letter seemed to be taking me to task for even asking for more precise accounting: I had no business asking for more information than had been given; I had agreed to the asked price when I was informed what was wanted, when I first asked. I could have the machinery if I paid the asking price. Period. 
     I felt the slap-in-the-face "How dare you?" tone to the letter. Made me wonder who'd written it, I didn't know her intimately, my impression of her until then had been that she's basically quite pleasant.
     I sent a letter of apology for the apparent misunderstanding, to spell out that I hadn't agreed to the wished-for price when it was stated. Explained I had meant that I understood what she wanted, but expected to be able to make an offer independent of that, which is what I had done. Her vehemence saddened me but risk-conscious me couldn't agree to take it all on spec. 
     The no-laundry problem did get resolved: I shared the story of my attempt at negotiation with a few friends and one of them (not the one who suggested it should be renamed Vicious Cycle, nor another who thought we should organize a non-profit Laundry Society to run it, but one who is like-minded and better-heeled - i.e., has more money to burn - than I. Once the owner's palm was crossed w/ enough silver to close the deal, it was all good on her, good on everyone.
     The Sturm und Drang, however, rang some warning bells: Trungpa was right (to paraphrase what he said in a talk he gave at Naropa in 1986): The problems of human beings require human solutions. Technofixes - even if we feel they are or will be sound ones, good arcological solutions to human problems - aren't enough, all by themselves. 
     That, I believe, is what has, up to now, impeded completion of the physical infrastructure of Arcosanti. No human habitat, no human dwelling-place (nor any animal one, for that matter) exists without infrastructure, without social organization of some kind. 
     Arcosanti's social organization was not included in the original plan (pacit  talk at Cosanti in the early 1960's about how "sweat equity" would be used to earn space), nor has any viable comprehensive plan for social organization and development yet been thoughtfully, carefully cultivated. 
     Which has meant that development could only continue as a wild thing does: hit or miss.  
     Which surely is why, 42 years later, that it is loved but not inhabited by the over 6000 people who have come to help build it.       
     How can communities build people if people do not build communities?

     I'm trying to get a grip. I'm almost 3 months back in New Denver, I'm not completely "moved in" to my apartment since I still have the boxes I had shipped from NM to WA waiting now in Metaline Falls, some miles below the border, until I can get there to pick them up. But for all that, it seems some people here have the impression that I am settled in. that I am living here. 
     I've enough history here for this to happen, for people to have an opinion about what they think I'm doing. Small town stuff. Sometimes - now, for instance - with a vengeance. 
     "When women gossip the result is someone doesn't sleep at night! Sleep at night!" (from Benjamin Britten's opera, "Peter Grimes")   
     Well, maybe my abode lacks not much in the way of conventional amenities, so maybe I do look settled. But I don't feel settled.  
     On the surface, no doubt, the place may seem fixed, give an impression of the familiar. Parrot (his name is Rochester, I decided) perches outside as he did in Victoria - although now he's upright rather than upside down. Some very nice pieces of dark furniture that Dennis once touched and used have places near the kitchen. A couple more, lighter in color, occupy the room in which I sleep. 
     Photos of Dennis hint at how he smiled, how he laughed with me, how he beamed radiant, patient indulgence at me. How he tolerated - cheered - my whims.  
     Very little about any of it makes me feel assured that I am here to stay. Why that is, I don't exactly know. Can't put my finger on it. Maybe it's because there were so many sailboats on Kootenay Lake that all I could think when I saw them was, Ah, Dennis would have wanted to see this! Maybe it's because, although I was told when I arrived, ready to take physical possession of my apartment in the Lodge (as it's called), ready to treat the place as if it were my own, that "There are no rules regarding tenancy. Just no loud noise-making after 11 pm" but my minor attempt to bring cheer into the common room, which was to place a virtually brand new juicer on an empty counter in its kitchen so that all the tenants (there are 10 of us, a few of whom have major health problems, who would very likely benefit from fresh-made juices) could use it, was met with: "You can't do that!" by the person who drops in to collect our rent checks and once a week plays bridge w/3 of her pals in the very same common room that I as a tenant may not use to share the use of a juicer. My statement that it would be fun to have an art exhibit - the Lodge has two longish corridors on which hang, at present, a collection of Rockwell prints, a few paintings and prints that seem to have been done by local artists or donated by former tenants - was met with: "No! You can't do that here." Maybe it's because, a few days ago, when it started getting too cold outdoors for my house plants, I placed them in the light of the windows of the common room where there is much sunlight, and also therefore a near-constant temperature (unlike my apartment, which has scarcely any direct sunlight and is therefore generally cool) I found, the next morning, that someone had moved them all outside. Outside the building.
     All of this reminds me, a bit, of the social capriciousness I observed (and experienced) at Arcosanti. Alas,
     How so?
     Well, because: The urban laboratory is an experiment, yes; but what is being tested? As the late Jeff Cook, a friend of the Soleri family who taught architecture at ASU, wondered: What is the experiment? What is being tested? 
     To which I might add: What testing methods are being used? How are the subjects selected? Is the selection random? Who collects the data? How is it managed? Who reviews the results? How are the results evaluated? Is there a comparison study or a control group? Where? How are the results communicated and to whom? To what authority? How are the results reviewed?    
     And so on...but I suspect - no, I am sure - those were not the questions in Paolo's mind when he first undertook construction of Arcosanti. 
     His vision was focused on construction; on his wish to see if the urban structures that flew from his agile mind through his agile fingers were more efficient, more economic, more energy-wise. Easier to heat in winter, keep cool in summer, easier to move about in. I am sure he imagined, he believed, that the experiment, the "real" experiment, whatever it was, would begin after all of the construction had been completed. When a few thousand people could come together to live, could gather together in the prototype 'arcology' because it would be complete, a total  habitat, ready for occupancy.  
     Mann plannt und Gott lacht...
     The experiment begins with us, with we who will lay claim to being its builders. We are its experiment, as much as it is ours.