by Elijah Greiner
My day starts six-o-clock. Not because it has to (I could certainly sleep another hour) but I like to live deliberately. I’m used to bunkhouses and dorm rooms. Here I have a room all to myself to stretch and dress without concern of waking up my housemates.

My breakfast is rolled oats from the Viroqua Food Co-op bulk-section, raw milk from the Amish farm down the road, and eggs from the chickens in my own backyard. I walk a few blocks down Decker St and East Ave to the college. On my way I hear the coo of mourning doves and look for signs of spring (no buds yet…). A Thoreauvian must pay attention to these kinds of things; we’ll all share our observations together here in a moment!

But I’ve arrived at the college with an hour to spare – this is the best time for quiet reading (and I’d sit on the picnic bench too if it wasn’t the middle of March)

Staff and students start to trickle inside. Time to go upstairs. Yoga. A song we sing together. Then we share our nature observations or our dreams.

Class begins at the college and I hop a stone’s throw across the street to the high school with my coat over my shoulder. The sophomores are studying poetry for their Main Lesson. As they are working steadily on the teacher’s assignment, I meet with each of them in turn to discuss the poem they have chosen to recite to the class tomorrow.

Next I walk a few blocks over to meet with someone. Viroqua is rich in artists, farmers, educators, social entrepreneurs, and mystics. Could you call
these individuals my professors? Mentors? Hard to say.
These are the people of Viroqua – the people you meet at barn dances, at ecstatic dances, at open-mic nights, or at Magpie Gelato.
Some followed the Grateful Dead. Some lived for years in the city.
Some still attend the Rainbow Gathering each summer. Some voted for Trump. Many compost their poop.
They are experts in things that cannot be found in a PhD course.

It’s midday now. I stride back to the college where a fellow Thoreauvian has prepared a hot lunch of their own inspiration in the robust community-center kitchen. We bless the meal with a song. Three big tables pushed together makes one big table for the whole school to eat around: Six students, four fellows, three faculty, and one artist resident.

What will the lunchtime conversation be today? Some rich subject always bubbles to the surface.
What would Plato say on the distinction between matter and spirit?
What would Kimmerer say on the consciousness of plants?
Are Robert’s Rules of Order necessary for egalitarian governance?

In the afternoon I might join the Thoreau College students on a bookbinding project, or pruning apple trees, or planting microgreens in the greenhouse.

Or I might help out a friend of mine. Putting up fliers for a community event; setting up a woodstove in a canvas tent.
These are friends I’ve made who live here in Viroqua, ages 18 to 80.

Before cooking myself dinner, I might have some more time to read or write in the afternoon.
Afterwards, it’s off to the old-time-music jam to practice strumming alongside fiddles, banjos, and guitars.