Down a Road, Slowly or One Year of Our Shared Discontent

This is Episode 7 in the story of the formation, rise and fall of the little education collective that used to exist up here on our mountain. I wrote and posted this account three years ago on my blog and then pulled it off because someone whose name I had not changed, objected. Now I have changed both the name of the little school itself, and the names of everyone who might be negatively impacted, and plan to re-post the story, one episode per day, until all 32 are again on my blog.

Down A Road, Slowly

or

One Year of Our Shared Discontent

Having now become a veteran of the court system, with my appearance in Judge Labowitz’ courtroom, I found that my experience was about to expand.  In Episode #4, Out of Step, I have documented Imika’s growing discontent at the traffic on the road.  Without being judgmental of the plaintiff, the members of Bell Springs were dismayed that all of our efforts to avoid conflict had still resulted in a lawsuit, to be settled in Superior Court, County of Mendocino.

When Imika had complained that there were too many cars, we reduced the number of vehicles that went past her house. When she complained that we drove too fast, we slowed to five miles per hour.  When she asked us to stop driving past her house and walk instead, we did so.  When she asked us to stop walking past her house and build a different route, we acquiesced and built a path.  When she took Joe to court, we threw in the towel, hired a lawyer and joined Joe in court. Like “The Fisherman’s Wife,” Imika had gone too far.  

I participated in eight separate lawsuits filed in the Superior Courthouse in Ukiah, five initiated by Imika and three by me.  The following events chronicle the injunction that Imika sought against Bell Springs and its members to limit/prevent egress and ingress to the school. We got pretty familiar with the jargon of the court.  

One of the documents submitted to the Honorable James W. Luther, in that first courtroom showdown, between  imika and Joe (Bell  Springs), was a letter that Imika had written and had had notarized on January 3rd, 1989.  I am recording the letter in this narrative, because it helps clarify for the reader her thought process during this time.  Dated December 28th, 1988, the letter read, verbatim, including errors in punctuation and usage, like this:

To Bell Springs Education Collective and Community Center,

Enclosed find copies of notorized letters.  The reason for writing is to notify all of you that your year and a half time limit to remove all encroachers which you are has come.  In spite of countless requests, meetings and warnings you have ignored and your encroachment has continued with no concern for my health, personal family life, peace of mind and privacy I have realized that I am dealing with a group of totally callous bunch with no concern as to how the stress from this situation affects my life let alone my privacy and well being or my daughters.   Since it is obvious that none of you have been taking my words seriously this notorized statement is to let you know that your time is up NOW and you are all to stay off my property from this time on as your ENCROACHMENT is totally unacceptable and remove yourselves permanently or face the legal repurcussions  of your violations of the law.  Joe and Karen have a right to cross my property to get to their property the rest of you do not.  I am totally serious about all this and I gave you all many chances to change the situation and you have chosen not to.

In all Sincerety, 

Corrine Chintz

Appeared before me this day January 3, 1989, Joyce Romero, Notary Public.

I included the letter, not so much because it adds to our knowledge of the case, but because the letter speaks for itself.  It speaks quite loudly, in fact, to the state of Imika’s mind.  For her it was simultaneously about injustice in the big picture, and unfairness at each step of the way.  The way her thoughts all seem to keep colliding with one another within her letter indicates a conflicted individual. The different avenues she was considering, kept crisscrossing her mind at an uncontrollable speed, causing her to act and speak frequently, in a disjointed manner. She wrote out the letters in an effort to clarify her thought process, without having the ability to see what everyone else could: she was so tangled up in anger that the result was a fisherman’s knot of confusion. No one saw it better than the members of the legal system.

Thus it was that we assembled once more in Ukiah, where the first question we asked Barry Vogel, Esquire, was, “How can she get away with this?  How can she sue us like this?  None of her arguments makes sense.”

Barry took his time answering, I think, just to make a point.  “Everyone has the right to file suit; it’s one of the cornerstones of our judicial system. You have the same rights.”

I remember Barry as though it were yesterday. He was a slight man, wearing steel rimmed glasses, his thinning, sandy-colored hair, neatly ignored.  With the possible exception of Richard Matlock, I have never seen such facial expressivity. When we would ask him a question, you could read the range of emotions that worked their way across that furrowed brow, his eyebrows rising precipitously at a peculiar notion. His clothing was informal, slacks and a button-down, and his manner was light and breezy, even though the winds of dissension swirled fiercely about him. The winds did not so much as ruffle his feathers. The actor Barry Fitzgerald brings Barry Vogel to mind, sans the lilt.

We had multiple meetings in his office, the most memorable being the one where Burk brought the watermelon.  Whether it was intellect or wit you wish to compare, I think Burk was the best match for Barry.  Sitting cross-legged on one of the office chairs, the watermelon straddling his knees, Burk bantered back and forth with Barry, after first courteously offering him some of his watermelon.

Though the letter above was dated January 3, 1989, the date on the final judgment for Joe, was January 11, 1990.  An entire year went by while we fiddled with the barrage of requests/demands that were thrown at us, before the issue was decided in Joe’s favor.  

One year of our shared discontent.

A Dark and Gloomy Night

This is Episode 6 in the story of the formation, rise and fall of the little education collective that used to exist up here on our mountain. I wrote and posted this account three years ago on my blog and then pulled it off because someone whose name I had not changed, objected. Now I have changed both the name of the little school itself, and the names of everyone who might be negatively impacted, and plan to re-post the story, one episode per day, until all 32 are again on my blog.

A Dark and Gloomy Night

“I did not try to kill your daughter. Will you please leave my property?  You are not welcome here.” I was speaking to Corrine Rose Chintz, or Imika as she called herself, upon her arrival at my complex on March 9th, 1989.

“I will not leave until you admit that you endangered my daughter.”  Ironically, she had come driving down my road at a frantic pace in her red four-wheel-drive FourRunner, to accuse me of driving too fast on her road that morning, when I had gone to Bell Springs Education Collective to pick up my son Casey.

“It is time for you to leave. I do not need my kids listening to this.” I didn’t think that was going to work, but I had very little practice in this.

“I am filing a restraining order against you in Ukiah.” She was getting warmed up.

“Fine, knock yourself out. I highly doubt that any judge would take your word against mine.”

“He will when I tell him how all of you are conspiring against me. You are all a bunch of liars.”

“Get off of my land, you witch. Go back to where you came from.”

Imika did not go quietly into the night. She left with a barrage of invective and tore past the house down to where it dead-ended. When she came rocketing back up the road, she passed our house at a rate of speed that probably matched the speed in her mind, that she believed I had been traveling, when I passed by her daughter earlier that day. It seemed like a long time ago, already.

True to her word, Imika filed the paperwork in Mendocino County’s Superior Court on the corner of State and Perkins Street.  I was ordered to appear at 9:30 on the morning of March 17th, the Honorable Eric Labowitz presiding. To add insult to injury, I was served my subpoena while at a family gathering, most likely that of my sister Laura’s birthday, at Pauline’s home on March 15th.  

I was totally flummoxed that Imika could file paperwork based on a fabrication. I was mortified that this could occur; I no more endangered the child’s life than I endangered her mother’s life, when she came on my property, ranting and raving.  

The entire courtroom scene was quite surreal, sitting with fourteen community members who had come down to Ukiah to bear witness to my character. Of all of the supporting comments that were made I will take Kat’s comment to my grave, one of the highest compliments I have ever had bestowed.

I sat amongst these friends, lamenting once again the nature of a judicial system which allowed people to use the mechanism to their benefit, instead of the designed purpose. Kat’s comment to me was, “Accusing you of endangering Misha, is the same as saying that Winnie the Pooh tried to harm her.”

I could see that Imika was angry at the collective; I was a member of the collective; therefore Imika was angry at me. I couldn’t see why she had to attack me in such an unfair way. I said something to that effect to Judge Labowitz when I was given the opportunity to speak.  But first I presented my case index cards and all.

The court had provided me with a copy of Imika's statement, which was included on the Petition for injunction Prohibiting Harassment. It read like this:

This suit is filed in Mendocino County because

 My 7 year old daughter was nearly run over by the reckless driver on our property and told to shut up by him.  he is an encroacher.

 March 9th, 1989.  Mark O'Neill drove by my home on a private road unreasonably fast.  I called the Bell Spring Education Collective and Community Center where he was going, (2 minutes from my home) and left a message for the driver of the silver Subaru to slow down.  Mark O'Neill drove back onto my property at full speed came to a stop at my driveway.  I told him from my home to slow down because people and animals were on the road on my property.  He was in a rage and made a nasty sign with his fingers and drove off at full speed.  My daughter Misha Chintz age 7 was near our gate on our property and had to jump out of the way to avoid being hit by his car.  She said to him "You might want to go a little slower there are people on the road" (meaning herself) He said to her " You shut up"  He jumped back into the car and drove off as fast as the car would go.  This man said to me later in the day when I told him to stay off my property because he had nearly run over and killed my daughter to "Kiss my ass, you bitch".  This man and his wife laughed and said it was a joke.

“Number one: Ms. Shins calls me a ‘reckless driver.’ In nineteen years of operating a motor vehicle, I have never been issued a moving violation. I am not a reckless driver.

Number two: She calls me “an encroacher”; I have a letter dated January 14th, 1989, granting me legal road access for ingress and egress to and from the property of Joe. I am not an encroacher.

 Number three: She says I was driving unreasonably fast. The standard speed is five miles an hour, so yes, I was driving three times that speed.  But fifteen miles per hour is not unreasonably fast.

Number four: She says I was in a rage. She is right that I was angry.  Annie had pneumonia, my boy was sick, and she thinks I’m driving too fast. Excuse me for living and breathing. Imploring her, with my hand extended supplicatingly, palm upward, is not "a nasty sign with his fingers."

May I explain about the gate? Ms. Chintz, through her daughter, plays this game with the gate on the far side of her house, the gate that everyone has to pass through if headed to the school. She will watch someone unlock the gate and pass through to the school, and then send the child out to re-lock the gate. It has happened over and over, and occurred again on this occasion. As I pulled up to the gate, Misha was off to one side and she said in a sing-song voice, ‘My mother doesn’t want you driving fast on her road.’ Where was her concern for her safety?  According to her mother, Misha had been terrified of my reckless driving.

Your Honor, my wife is petrified of this woman. She would not come to this hearing, because of this fear. She fears for the psychological health of her boys, who are exhibiting signs of stress, which include nightmares about the school. Now Ms. Chintz has publicly accused me of reprehensible acts that I did not commit, in an effort to attain some measure of satisfaction against the members of Bell Springs.

This accusation is totally false. If you grant Ms. Chintz this restraining order, it’s the same thing as convicting me without a trial. Your Honorable Honor, sir.” I almost genuflected to him. He shuffled his papers in response and then spoke, quietly, making eye contact with me.

“Listen, Mr. O’Neill. I understand your position; however, you do not comprehend the total depth and breadth of a restraining order. It is not a declaration of guilt. It is a system the court has in place of protecting not only the plaintiff, but the court itself. I do not know whether Ms. Shins is presenting the truth or not; this is not a trial. However, if I allow you both to walk out of here today, without granting the restraining order, and you turn around and harm her, how does that make the court look?

What I can do for you, is make the restraining order mutual so that both of you are bound by the same set of rules.”

Though dismayed at the prospect, I saw the reasoning, even if I felt it did not apply to me. Judge Labowitz didn’t know if I was Jack the Ripper or Winnie the Pooh, but he did know that no one was going to come pounding on his chambers door, announcing that the plaintiff for a denied restraining order had just been assaulted by the person intended to be restrained.

I took little consolation in the fact that Annie and the three boys were named on the restraining order as being household members who were protected likewise from Imika.  

It was a dark and gloomy March night.

Restraint

This is Episode 5 in the story of the formation, rise and fall of the little education collective that used to exist up here on our mountain. I wrote and posted this account three years ago on my blog and then pulled it off because someone whose name I had not changed, objected. Now I have changed both the name of the little school itself, and the names of everyone who might be negatively impacted, and plan to re-post the story, one episode per day, until all 32 are again on my blog.

Restraint

I had spent the morning of March 9, 1989, working in Legget on an electrical problem, and arrived home approximately 11:40 AM, to find Annie talking on the phone to Bell Springs. The person on the phone told her that my son, six-year-old Casey, was ill and running a fever; could we come and pick him up? Annie had been under doctor’s care at that same time for pneumonia and strep throat, and my youngest, Lito, was sick.  I was therefore not surprised to get the phone call, and I was more than happy to go get him.

Because it was raining very hard and Casey was running a fever, I chose to exercise my right to ignore the Bell Springs policy to park in the designated area, and walk the five-minute path to the school. Obviously, I did not want Casey to have to make the same trek back to the car in the rain.  Having made the choice before I got to the vicinity, I went directly through the open gate just prior to Imika’s residence, and straight to the school at my customary rate of speed. The driving rain and the novelty of the occasion, i.e, driving in forbidden territory, restrained any interest I might have had in driving fast.

The dirt road had the usual number of potholes, nature’s speed bumps, and was very muddy from the recent days of rain and snow. In the interim between the time I had passed Imika’s house and the time I appeared at the school to pick up Casey, Imika had placed a call to the collective registering a complaint that I was driving too fast. I restrained any impulse I had to shoot the messenger upon hearing of the reported grievance, as I retrieved Casey without dallying, and headed back along the road.

One look at his ruddy complexion and the twin rivulets of nasal drip, descending down his upper lip to his mouth, made me resoundingly happy that I had skipped the formality of subjecting Casey to the trial of having to walk the path. 

Again, I was prevented from driving too fast, not only by the weather, but by the fact that, after I had passed through the gate on my way to the school, Imika had sent Misha out into the rain to lock the gate. I couldn’t help wondering why she didn’t fight her own battles instead employing a little person, whose only interest in life would have been to please her mother. I restrained myself from overreacting. 

So I was doing a lot of restraining there on my little trip to get Casey.  Imika seemed to like the concept, because she filed a restraining order against me, alleging that I had driven recklessly past her house and that I had endangered her daughter’s life. Indeed, her daughter was very much in evidence but judging from her actions, she did not appear to feel her life was in danger.  Quite the contrary. As I approached the now closed gate, I could clearly see Misha sashaying toward me with an exaggerated motion.

She was dressed in an oversized brown coat, most likely that of her mom, with the suggestion that it was the handiest thing available, when Imika saw me “rocket” past her abode on my way to the school. I suggest that the coat belonged to Imika because she had one just like it, one with a cowgirl motif with the rows of strips of uniform pieces of rawhide, lining the arms and across her shoulders. These little strips of rawhide swayed rhythmically as Misha sashayed away from the gate toward me. She seemed to be enjoying herself.

Her two arms were stretched out to either side of her, with her hands up next to her head, palms facing me, fingers splayed out widely on both hands. She was simultaneously walking toward me and dipping first to the left, and then to the right. She had just come from locking the gate; she would have known from her mom’s frantic efforts to get her into the coat and out to the gate, before I returned, that the game was afoot. Misha was a bright little girl, who knew her mom was engaged in a feud over the school, and she knew that if Imika told her she needed to lock the gate, then that was an end to it.

Having prudently decided not to take my little Subaru and try to ram my way through the metal gate, I stopped short enough from the gate, to be able to maneuver in front of the car to the combination lock.  Luckily I had been at the last meeting to find out that the combo had just been changed again to the uncannily clever number, 2222, so I now could open it.

Neither my actions,nor those of the child, indicated a man on a murderous mission.

Later that evening around six o’clock, Imika parked her car out in front of my gate, setting off our dog, who barked incessantly throughout the ensuing exchange. She was very animated, her face contorted with emotion, her hair a briar’s nest of inattention. She wasted no time as I spilled out the front door, Annie on my heels and the boys elbowing their way for position, delighted at the prospect of some entertainment. I had no idea what to expect.

The first words out of her mouth indicated a need for volume control. “You tried to kill my daughter. I am sick and tired of you people always driving past my house recklessly.”

Well, that certainly gave me an inkling as to what I could expect. I wished I could back the truck up five minutes and exit, stage left, but that was not going to happen.  

I figured I had to talk to her.

Out of Step

This is Episode 4 in the story of the formation, rise and fall of the little education collective that used to exist up here on our mountain. I wrote and posted this account three years ago on my blog and then pulled it off because someone whose name I had not changed, objected. Now I have changed both the name of the little school itself, and the names of everyone who might be negatively impacted, and plan to re-post the story, one episode per day, until all 32 are again on my blog.

Out of Step

Now with Karen no longer serving as district liaison, word went out that if anyone was interested in pursuing an emergency teacher’s credential, this would be a great time to do so; otherwise, say goodnight to that element of Bell Springs Collective. That was when I decided to go for it. I already had my bachelors degree from San Jose State, so I figured I would take a stab at it. Karen, Beth and I went down to talk to Brian Buckley, the superintendent of Laytonville schools, and told him about the plan. He was very supportive, and it was nice that I got to meet him and work with him, because it gave me a leg up on the middle school job down the line, the one that was to occupy me for the next sixteen years.

Now, however, I was on the track to getting a California Teaching Credential within one calendar year, so that when school opened again in the fall, I would be the bonafide contract teacher. Brian had granted my request for an emergency credential, with the stipulation that I complete the credentialing process within one calendar year.  That made sense to me, because I could not see stretching that out any longer than necessary.   

 

The situation was very straightforward. The members of the collective had repeatedly been available to help Imika out with problems brought on by her being a single parent. The community as a unit pitched in and helped because it saw this person in need. She had an infant and more serious problems, such as disappearing for three days, seeming to forget that she had a daughter. However, the inability of Bell Springs to convince Imika that the schoolwork had to be consistently addressed turned out to be the beginning of the end. From the collective’s perspective, the child belonged in school five days a week; otherwise she was going to end up well out of step with her peers.

Imika was outraged that the child had been dismissed from the school.  She felt betrayed even though members had tried to impress upon her the sense of responsibility that the collective required. The resulting bitterness was to have an unending effect on her; her very soul was rocked-albeit, unintentionally-off of its fulcrum. Over the course of the next year or so, and actually at least until 1996, which was when she filed her final lawsuit against members of the collective, Imika allowed her actions to be swayed by this bitterness.

Whether she was mentally ill, emotionally imbalanced, plain angry, or some combination of the three, I do not know and I do not care to conjecture. She was who and what she was.  My focus is on the way the community-her community-came first to her defense, and then, later, to Misha’s defense.  Imika went about the business of using the legal system to pursue her own agenda, in an effort to discredit Bell Springs, because she felt as though she had been stabbed in the back. It does not matter whether or not her logic made sense to us. She was relentless; she spent hundreds of hours in the court library and she defended herself because she could/would not pay for a lawyer.

As a community the members of Bell Springs did everything in our power to avoid conflict. However, when the legal proceedings dictated that we defend ourselves, we hired a lawyer. As I relate this narrative, my goal is to present the dual stories of my efforts to obtain a California Teaching Credential, and Bell Spring’s efforts to retain the integrity of the collective and its members.

Chronologically, events unfolded as Imika began to protest that there was too much traffic going by her house, both in the mornings and in the afternoons. The traffic created dust and the dust coated everything, Imika said. As early as 1985, she protested to Joe that the traffic past her house was unacceptable. With the most students ever enrolled at this period in time being fifteen, and some of the kids carpooling, there could not have been more than five or six vehicles on any given morning. It didn’t matter how many there were; it only mattered that there was vehicular activity and it annoyed her.  Joe’s response to her complaint was that he believed he had unlimited right to use the easement.

Imika continued to register her complaints with Joe.  In addition to regular school traffic, she complained about special school events, and she reported that children had once thrown rocks at her horses. In August of 1987, she told Joe he had until the end of 1988 to limit the use of the easement to her satisfaction, or she would take him to court. By the end of 1988, she maintained that the use of the road had not diminished. On January 14, 1989 Joe wrote to Imika, insisting he had unlimited legal access over the road for his school.  On February 27, 1989, Imika filed for an injunction to limit Joe’s use of the road easement to its level of use in 1982, when there was only a trailer for a preschool on the site of the school.

She asked/demanded that the collective start parking its vehicles on the far side of her house, and walking the last two to three minutes, past her residence to the school.  It was an unreasonable request by any yardstick, and yet, we went along with it. No one liked the vibe that Imika emitted in those days. She was so acidic that parents did not wish to subject the kids to her negative energy any more than absolutely necessary.

So we walked for a period of time, until she again protested that our presence every morning and afternoon was annoying and unacceptable.  By this time, no one would have blamed us if we just ignored her, or better still, went back to driving past her house.  However, the same spirit that moved us to acquiesce to the initial requests, now required that we once again go along with her further demands.

The only feasible way around the dilemma was to construct a path below her place by maybe two-three hundred feet, so that we could gain access to the school, without having to pass by her house.  It seems preposterous that one individual would impose her will on a group of unwilling individuals, but no one had the interest nor the energy to pursue an acrimonious course of action. It was infinitely easier to gather everyone together one Saturday and simply cut a 42 inch wide path into the side of the hill, leading from Joe’s place, straight over to the school, a distance of maybe two football fields, end for end.  It didn’t even take the whole day, and we were feeling good about the way we had dealt with the problem.

Nothing worked. We still needed to keep a vehicle at the school during student hours in case of emergency, so that still meant at least one vehicle going past her residence. All of the events came to a head in March of 1989. Imika had filed the road easement lawsuit in February, Misha had been dismissed from the collective, effective at the end of the school year, and I was no longer working for her.  

And then one day, I got a phone call.

The Deal Breaker

This is Episode 3 in the story of the formation, rise and fall of the little education collective that used to exist up here on our mountain. I wrote and posted this account three years ago on my blog and then pulled it off because someone whose name I had not changed, objected. Now I have changed both the name of the little school itself, and the names of everyone who might be negatively impacted, and plan to re-post the story, one episode per day, until all 32 are again on my blog.

The Deal Breaker

“I understand, Honey, but why don’t you just explain that to my boys? Better still, why don’t you explain it to Annie? Just be prepared to draw back a stump.” I was trying to explain to Imika why not getting paid for my carpentry was never going to fly.

“I am trying as hard as I can to work something out. Just give me a few days. What are you going to do?” 

“Well, ultimately, I’m not going to do anything. I’m not going to finish the paneling in the kitchen. I’m not going to do any retaining wall, and I am not building any additions.”

Imika’s face fell, as I dismissed the plans she had been discussing, ever since I had been working here. “What if I get the money?”

“Well, Imika, I don’t think there’s any question that you are not going to get the money.  The question is, when?  How do I know if I get involved in these other projects, that you won’t have another cash-flow problem? I can’t afford to have that take place. My creditors do not seem to understand when I tell them it is not my fault that I cannot make my land payment.  So what do you think about that?”

“I can make arrangements. I just didn’t expect this other transaction to fail. I won’t let it happen again.”

She was true to her word, which was fortunate, because as her behavior towards the other members of the collective began to escalate, I began to get sort of worried.  

The central conflict with Bell Springs School began because Imika failed to maintain her parental responsibilities in participating in the collective. In addition to a tuition, which went towards the acquisition of teaching supplies, including books, a child’s parents were required to spend ten hours a month in some capacity around the school.  It could be helping out in the classroom or it could be working on a project, like the one we did the first month I was on board: building a wheelchair ramp, so that the school was accessible to all.

We did work parties where we all combined to cut, split, haul and stack firewood for the school.  We did raffles for which we would need to cut, split, haul, deliver and stack cords of firewood to the winner(s), and we did fund raisers up at Reggae on the River, back when it was “Electric on the Eel” and that is going back a ways.  The Bell Springs booths were epic efforts by our entire community, to prepare and sell an array of foodstuffs, from baked goods and pizza bread, to ice cones, coffee and organic green salads. Different years featured different menus, but the cast of characters remained those involved in the collective.

Years down the line Marbry would regale us with stories of keeping both the booth running efficiently, and her sanity, though which was the one with the less tenuous grasp was hard to say. She seemed to be keeping her sanity, but was that possible? She told us she used to rely on Casey to help out when it got late. She could hand him the cash box and ask him to tally it up and she would bunk down in the booth. 

I would love to give examples from personal experience, but my participation in Reggae was exclusively behind the scenes. I could help haul the  booth up to the site, and I could be part of the set-up, but I could never have functioned amongst all those people, without having to bail out.  I could even do Pignic, because there were fewer people, and I knew everyone who was in charge, but never Reggae.

More serious problems between Imika and Bell Springs Scholl materialized originally because she was not spending any time at the school putting in her ten hours. This was the first problem, and it was one that could be overlooked in an effort to avoid a confrontation. The second problem could not be overlooked. Misha was not fulfilling the terms of the contract that she was issued each week, something that was key to the success of the collective. All students were issued contracts to cover the two school days’ work that took place in the home.  The way the schedule was set up, the kids had three days in a row at school and then four consecutive at home.  

Parents worked with kids at home the way parents have always been encouraged to interact with their children, when it comes to lending support for homework.  A child with no support from within the home is more likely to falter when it comes to fulfilling other educational responsibilities. Unfortunately for Imika, it was a central stipulation for participation in Bell Springs.  In fact it was a deal breaker. 

Karen had the responsibility of assessing the work and subsequently, the progress of the children at the collective. For Karen to examine all of the returned work, and not notice the discrepancy between that turned in by Misha, and that turned in by the others, was unthinkable.    There was nothing wrong with Misha’s intellectual capabilities.

Karen’s efforts to get Imika to take a greater part in the educational process yielded nothing. Eventually Karen was left with no choice, but to inform the school district that she was no longer willing to oversee Misha’s contract because she was not willing to take the chance that Misha’s academic liabilities would be associated with her mentorship, and that made Karen withdraw from the entire process, effective at the end of that current school year (1988-89).

As a result of everything that occurred, the decision was made to dismiss Misha from the collective. If the terms of the contract could not be met by Imika, the collective felt that it was in Misha’s best interests to go to school in town, where she could be immersed in classroom activities five days a week.

Without a district liaison, Bell Springs could no longer function as an entity of the district.  The contract money that was paid first to Karen, and then later, to me, went directly into the collective coffers to defray the cost of the materials used on a daily basis.  The school could and would still go on without that money, but no one wanted to sever connections with the district, because the liaison kept the little collective aligned with the curriculum of the district.  Eventually the Bell Springs kids went down to the school in town about middle school age, and no one wanted our kids entering the school system, out of synch with the rest of the students.

Food for Da Boys

This is Episode 2 in the story of the formation, rise and fall of the little education collective that used to exist up here on our mountain. I wrote and posted this account three years ago on my blog and then pulled it off because someone whose name I had not changed, objected. Now I have changed both the name of the little school itself, and the names of everyone who might feel negatively impacted, and plan to re-post the story, one episode per day, until all 32 are again on my blog.

Food for Da Boys

“I live back on Cow Mountain in an octagon, and I need to have some insulation and paneling installed. Can you do that kind of work?” The speaker was Corrine Rose Chintz, also known as Imika, a woman I had met briefly once, several years earlier, but had not seen since.

“Well, sure, I can do just about anything. You have the advantage on me. You know who I am, but I do not know you.” I did know her, but she obviously had forgotten the connection, and I preferred to start from scratch. I had heard various stories about this individual, and I knew that she did not follow a conventional life style. Well, that was OK with me. Lots of people up here on the mountain have what might be considered odd lifestyles. On the other hand, living in the middle of suburbia, and spending two hours in traffic to go to and from work each day, seemed odd to those of us up here on the mountain. Different strokes for different folks, as ole Sly said so eloquently, back in the day. Imika’s money was as good as anyone’s and my prospects were not high at the moment.

“Oh. I’m Imika.”  She looked around as if checking to see if she was being observed.  It was a Sunday morning and there was no one but Carol in the place.  If I hadn’t heard of her, I might have asked what her last name was, but that wasn’t necessary. My parents knew Imika, because they used to act as a liaison between her parents, who lived in Florida, and Imika, who did not have a phone. There was no phone service in such a remote spot where she lived, and the technology for cell phone use was still very primitive.  I remember building a battery house for Al and Marguerite sometime in that period, so there was the technology, but I just don’t think she was organized enough to pull that off.  

When Imika’s father would call my parents’ house and leave a message, my father would feel compelled to drive back to her house and deliver the message. “Ah, she’s all right, just a little dingy,” he’d say.  “She can’t help the way the girl dresses her in the morning.”  My dad had a hard enough time with names as it was, to expect him to remember Misha’s name.

“So you live right next door to the school then,” I said.  “We have been checking it out, because our boys are gong to be attending the collective when they get old enough.”

She nodded.  “Yes, that’s right.” The earrings that she wore dangled well below her lobes, and appeared to be some sort of Native American motif, swaying back and forth as her head moved. She was dressed very uniquely in a shimmering, forest-green gown, which hung to her sandals, emphasizing her wafer-thin frame. She looked unhealthily thin, with her eyes sunken deep within their sockets. Her pale complexion was not helped by the green of her dress. 

“Well, then, it should be easy to arrange for me to have a look-see, since I’ll be going right by your place to get to the school. And if I remember correctly, you have a child in the school also. Am I right?”

The earrings danced again, as her head bobbed.  “Misha. Yes, my daughter is in the collective.”

“It must be nice living right down the road from the school. You don’t have to worry about finding a parking place.”

A pained expression crossed over her face, as she contemplated what I had said. “When can you stop by?” she asked, ignoring my comment just as I ignored the pained expression.

“I am going to the school Tuesday. Would ten in the morning work?”

“Far out.  I’ll see you then.”

When I got home and shared the conversation with Annie, she jostled my memory a bit, so that I remembered a few of the stories that had circulated within the community. In addition to cannabis, Imika liked to ingest peyote and mescaline, though the only thing I ever saw her indulge in was cannabis. Copious amounts. We had heard the most widely circulated story about how she had left her daughter unattended, and “consorted” with aliens for a three-day period. I was not part of the Cow Mountain community back there at the time this incident took place, and I was not part of the process of taking care of Misha.  It just meant that there were some issues here, of either drugs or an emotional nature.

Still, the stories meant nothing to me, as long as the money came through at the end of each week. For the most part it did.  Imika could clearly see that I took my responsibilities seriously, whether on the job site, or with my family.  I was not working in the construction field for my health. I was working because we were living paycheck to paycheck. If Imika could not pay me my wages at the end of the week, it was not me she had to worry about banging on her front door, it was Annie.

Annie was the one who mostly made the trips to town “to buy da food for da boys.” If there were no money to take care of business, things could get dicey.  I didn’t even have to tell Imika that.  There was really only one crisis, when a transaction that was scheduled to take place, did not, and Imika was left standing there trying to explain to me that “it was not her fault.” She had come up with eight hundred dollars, but was twelve hundred short. Since I worked at the ten-dollar-an-hour rate, that represented 120 hours, or three weeks’ worth of work.  This was unacceptable.

Unfortunately, it being only three weeks from Christmas, timing was of the essence.  The eight hundred dollars that she had given me was enough to pay off Dave, the guy who I had hired to help on the job, but left nothing with which to buy groceries.  

We were sailing along on a prayer.

A Chance to Try on Life

This is Episode 1 in the story of the formation, rise and fall of the little education collective that used to exist up here on our mountain. I wrote and posted this account three years ago on my blog and then pulled it off because someone whose name I had not changed, objected. Now I have changed both the name of the little school itself, and the names of everyone who might be negatively impacted, and plan to re-post the story, one episode per day, until all 32 are again on my blog.

Bell Springs Education Collective

or

A Chance to Try on Life

I saw an old friend the other day and he mentioned Bell Springs Education Collective and how successful it had been as a learning environment. He commented that he had always felt that the kids who went to school there seemed so much more enthusiastic about education, and did not have to be coerced to participate. He asked me what the secret was, and I told him there was no secret. The reason the kids enjoyed being there is because everyone did, and that kind of energy is contagious.

Bell Springs Educational Collective was formed in the early-eighties by a dedicated group of community members who lived up on Cow Mountain, in Northern Mendocino County. The collective was accessible by navigating up Bell Springs Road three miles, turning off and traveling up and around the Cow.  Bell Springs EdCo was located on the backside of the Cow, on Joe’s land, where the two-room school was built in two construction phases. That the school was built on Joe’s land made sense to me, because he was married to Karen, who was the teacher who served as the liaison between Bell Springs EdCo and the Laytonville Unified School District. By the time Annie and I joined the collective in 1987, there were at least ten families involved, with kids ranging in grade levels from kindergarten through fifth grade.

The parents who were involved in the collective were a fiercely independent group of individuals.  They had to be to live up here in the coastal mountains of Northern California, above three thousand feet elevation, where the winters are harsh and the reality of making one’s way around for the most basic of needs, presents quite a challenge.  These folks were not interested in the traditional public school setting, so much as they were interested in creating an environment, in which the kids wanted to be.  In that arena these parents felt their kids would be in a better position to be receptive to higher education down the line.

I have always considered the core of the collective to be five families, who were involved at the time we joined, and who were instrumental in the formation of the collective.  Allow me to emphasize that there were others, but these five families were the rock upon which the collective was founded. Those five families were headed respectively by John and Marbry, Al and Marguerite, Joe and Karen, John and Beth, and Will and Kat.

These parents had high expectations of their kids, and those anticipations were extended to the other kids of the collective. There was a ratio of no greater than five students to one parent/teacher, so there was excellent support for presentation of curriculum. I never felt there was any inherent dislike of the public school system by the members of Bell Springs, so much as there was a passion to create the best possible environment and that did not exist down in town.

The philosophy or mission statement of the collective was three pages long, but the concept that leaped out at me was in part, “To encourage the child to be imaginative, as this strengthens the mind, developing inventiveness and the ability to visualize possible circumstances and values for future life.  This gives the young child a chance to try on life before it is fully upon him or her.”  This statement embodies a philosophy that puts the child in a position to extract the most out of an early educational experience, and to be better prepared for the challenges of higher education.

The account I would like to present is my own. I have not talked to others about it, because everyone will have his or her own opinion about what occurred, and may have a different version of the events.  I am primarily focused on how it unfolded within the fabric of my own family.  The reason I feel compelled to tell the story is because it involves the circumstances behind which led to my joining the Laytonville School District in 1990 as a middle school teacher, specializing in language arts.

***

I was in the Czech Lodge one day, when Corrine Rose Chinz approached me and asked, “Are you Mark O’Neill?” It was September of 1987 and I was working independently, mostly up on the ridge, with the occasional job in Leggett or even Laytonville.

“I am,” I replied. “May I help you?” I was looking at a slender woman-emaciated, even-whose hair was an undisciplined mass of confusion atop her head.  It had the appearance of having been very pretty at some point in the distant past, but had been allowed to ramble freely for too long a time to bring it back into play. I knew her as Imika and had met her the first summer Annie and I were up here, over at Ben’s house in 1982.  He and Shannon had had a gathering in late October, and we had taken Casey over for his inaugural mountain party.

I had met Imika for the first time at this party, and the one thing that stood out was that she informed me that she and Misha’s father, Stan, had experience a “crop failure.”  Exactly what that looked like, I had no idea. Moreover, I was not sure why she was telling me this, but I think she just considered it small talk.  

Now in the Czech Lodge, she answered, “I hope you can help me.  I need to have some carpentry done on my house and your name was given to me by more than one person.”  The voice was as soft and wispy as those strands of hair that refused to be part of the mass above.  I found myself leaning forward to hear just a bit better.

“What kind of carpentry?  What did you have in mind?”   I was always willing to listen to a job offer.