The hardware shed, full of many rusty yet still usable items and implements.

My introduction elicits one "hi." That's it. Nothing more. Just as I am about to run for cover in my car, I remember that I have a contact person and suddenly understand why I need one. "Is Keith around?" I ask the room in general. Somebody points. Keith knows who I am! He greets me and tells me exactly what I don't want to hear: Dinner is running late. Get to work.

Now I want to cry. Hippie commune. Winding road. Almost killed deer. Car is laughing at me. Why am I wearing a fleece with the logo for an internet site on it? They're going to know I'm mainstream!

I calm down. The worst has happened. Someone has requested that I help out in the kitchen. Although I do not count culinary expertise among my list of talents, I do know how to wash dishes. While washing, I finally make someone's acquaintance. His name is Joel, and he has one of the kindest faces I have ever seen. Perhaps this opinion is influenced by the fact that he seems to want to talk to me.

When the dinner is ready, we all shuffle into the dining room. Keith announces the moment of silence and we all hold hands. When he breaks the silence, he asks if anyone would like to sing a song. The song we choose is "Twinkle Twinkle Little Star."

I make it through burritos without a hitch, and without saying a word. I am happy to note that there are both vegetarian and non-vegetarian options available; one myth about communes down, one million to go. After dinner, I wash dishes again. This time, I talk to several different people. When the last dish has been washed, Ira invites me to join some residents in one of the cabins for some home-brewed beer. They brew beer in communes? I grab a mug and follow him outside and across the footpath to a small cabin across the way. I sneer at my car – Who's laughing now? I'm about to go get drunk with a bunch of hippies!

The night is long, even though I am the first to go to bed. About an hour after I enter the cabin, someone passes me a hand-made drum and tells me it is my turn to play. This is the second horrifying request of the evening – and I've only been on the farm for four hours. I have never played a drum, I realize, as I attempt to maintain a steady rhythm. No one seems to regret passing the instrument my way, which is good. However, after passing it to the person next to me, I notice that there is a mandolin-like object on the other side of the room. Frightened of the possibilities, I excuse myself and head back to the main house.

Chores include raking leaves, dinner and dishes, and childcare for the nine children currently living at Alpha. The schedule serves to remind farmers of their tasks, which change daily, and is also used by some to monitor the work done by their "brothers and sisters."

Although it has always been an integral component of Alpha Farm's system, the schedule has recently become a topic of debate among the farmers.

Many people are drawn to Alpha because they want to escape the rigidity of societal structure. They assume that Alpha will offer more freedom to do what they choose, when they choose to do so, without "the politics and the scheduling and the line-drawing." "I gave up a good job... because I was just tired of doing that nine-to-five in such a structured environment," says Robert, who moved to Alpha several months ago. "And I think here, it's almost like that."

However, just like any other farm, Alpha cannot survive on ideals. It requires hard work and dedication.

"Living in this community and most communities is hard work. I do not suggest it for a lot of people... It is not for running away from having to work," Caroline says. "You choose to work... No one imposed it; we chose it. And in that sense it is different than you having to go to a nine-to-five at McDonald's in order to get your paycheck in order to eat."

Some of the newer Alpha farmers want to recreate the farm's beauty, and re-glorify its image, even if it means weeding out the people who aren't doing their work.

"The farm looking the way it looks, it brings people's energy down," says Robert. "We need some new blood... Let's bring back the dignity of Alpha, and the whole concept of being here and get rid of the people who are just sucking it dry." But it is difficult to "get rid of" people in a community where everyone shares authority.

"How do you either instill some work ethic into somebody like that so they can help support the community on a whole, or how do you say 'good-bye' to somebody that you genuinely care about?" asks James, who has lived on the farm since August.

Caroline says that people who do not belong "usually choose themselves out." But the underlying philosophical issue in debate on the farm is disagreement about when to work and why.

The first pantry, full up with canned anything: salsa, jam, fruit, pickles...

On Friday, it is apparently the visitor's turn to rake leaves. Another thing I've never done, but I've seen it on TV, which is just as good. Everything is fine until I get a blister. Just when I don't think I can bring myself to rake one more leaf, I am saved by the lunch bell . After lunch, Keith gives me a tour of the farm. He offers me lots of fodder for my assignment, which I'd almost forgotten about.

At 5 p.m., someone mentions that it happens to be the visitor's turn to cook dinner. Can it be possible that I am being asked to cook dinner, by myself, for 35 people? They cook from scratch in this place! I don't know the difference between an oat and a grain; how am I going to transform little tiny seeds into food? Luckily, there are two other people assigned to the task as well. As my inexperience becomes evident rather swiftly, I get to cut vegetables and stir the sauce for an hour. After dinner, I decide to forgo the beer and drum session and head back to my room early.

The next morning, I conduct my interviews. If anything has made me feel like an outsider at Alpha Farm – lending a hand in the kitchen, playing the drums, wearing deodorant – my tape recorder is the clincher. Why have I spent almost 48 hours trying to fit in, when I knew all along that I would eventually align myself on the other side of the microphone?

After my first few interviews, the advantage is clear. If I had simply presented myself as a reporter, no one would have talked openly with me. But I find that by putting myself on the line in their world, they will do the same for me.

"We want to live on a farm, which is hard work to begin with," Caroline says. "We want to have a garden. That's work. In the rest of the world, that's not work."

The farmers are not unanimous in their dedication, because they are not united in favor of the way priorities are enforced. For some, the immediate goal is to get Alpha back on its feet by replacing shingles and roofs, planting more crops and restoring the hardware shed. For others, improving the physical nature of the farm is a long-term goal. Before that goal is attained, priority is placed on gaining coherence and harmony among the farmers, which may entail suspending the schedule and doing work only when work feels right.

For many farmers, the schedule has come to represent the idea of work as an infliction of guilt. In the larger society, workers do things because they are afraid of repercussions, afraid that their peers will not respect them if they do not work. Many people come to Alpha to put a stop to that fear.

"The ministry of fear is over," says Dakota, who has lived at Alpha for several months. "We don't do things out of fear. We do them because we love to do them."

But other farmers say that rising above the fear of repercussions has become synonymous with ignoring work that needs to be done.

"Anarchism and community don't live side by side very easily," Caroline says. "We would love to do just anything. Hang out and listen to music all day... and do artistic things. Who in the world doesn't want to do that?... If you think that there is such a thing as paradise, where you can have everything you want and not work, hey – you should do it! But that's not here."

Discussion of fear, guilt and work abound at Alpha, where debate is the ultimate tool for resolution. There is no violence, no hard drugs and little alcohol consumption. Community members relieve tension by talking about their problems and controversies. "Relationships are so important here that if you're having a problem and need to talk it out with somebody, it's more important than working," says Keith, who puts an extremely high premium on hard work.

Despite the constant discussion and debate on the farm, at the end of the day a glowing optimism remains. "I think it'll work out," Robert says of his stay at Alpha. "For me, it'll work out... especially considering what's happening all over the world, in the cities. It's madness; it's complete insanity."

The one thing farmers will not contemplate is Alpha's failure. After 30 years, there is little tolerance for pessimism.

"Someone said that when I died, the farm was going to fold," Caroline says. "And someone said to him, 'You don't know Alpha!' There's no way that would happen."

My weekend is over, and it's time to leave. I wonder if my car, which has been moved to the parking lot with all the other commune cars, felt the way I did this weekend. Did she feel mainstream, because of her lack of save-the-earth bumper stickers?

When I get in and close the door, I realize how much I've missed being alone, responsible only for self and vehicle. Sure, it would be nice to live with a bunch of people, share everything and make dinner from things you pick out of the ground – but I am definitely not at that level yet.

I pull out of Alpha, back on to the road. It's a little early, but what the hell: Next stop: Taco Bell!

Questions?
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