Milena Moser on sharing food: breaking bread

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Steph would be the last person I could imagine joining a commune. With her blow-dried gray hair, elegant blazers and silk scarves, I always thought she was a wealthy heiress. She has to laugh, “Who says I can’t be both? This is America, baby!

Appearances can be deceiving, and not just in America. I should know this by now. Steph shrugs. “I feel like this is a different life,” she says. “My late husband and I went on a hippie trip in the ’70s and got back into nature and stuff like that.”

And they moved into the middle of nowhere somewhere in Texas, two families with children and different personalities, fugitives, draft dodgers. “We wanted to lay the foundation for a better society,” she says. “You know, no money, no ambition, no greed. Only what nature provides, what we can produce ourselves or, if necessary, exchange…”

She describes how they drove through a small village in their Volkswagen bus, with what seemed like a hundred pairs of eyes following them. Their neighbors, ordinary peasants and factory workers, looked at them with great suspicion, if not hostility. But then the VW bus became the victim of a collision with a deer. The tow truck belonged to a neighbor, and since they had no money, they traded his services for a dead deer. And that same evening, tables and chairs were set up outside and reindeer burgers were handed out to everyone. The farms were located far from each other, and not all of them had telephone connections. But for some reason everyone heard about the unexpected feast and everyone contributed to it.

“We were actually vegetarians,” says Steph. “But at that moment something else was more important.” They brought tomatoes and onions from their garden and have been accepted ever since. “It was then that I learned the most important lesson in my life: no matter how little you have, there is always something to share and always something to offer. It doesn’t matter who comes through the door.”

This rule helped her avoid execution several years later. “One of our neighbors was a Vietnam veteran, a loner and a scary guy—he probably suffered from PTSD.” The corrupt local council had cheated some farmers out of their land, and many were unhappy. At the meeting, the veteran suddenly appeared in the small town hall, hung with all the weapons he had, and there were a lot of them.

He started shooting randomly, but miraculously no one was killed. However, television news warned of a dangerous terrorist in hiding.

“However, we did not have television, and we only noticed the excitement on the sidelines. So, I was standing in the kitchen, stirring some baked beans, when he suddenly burst in, brandishing a rifle. Just out of habit and without thinking, I said: “Sit down, dinner will be ready soon,” and he, probably also out of habit, sat down at the table and ate three plates of my stew. He then politely thanked me and left again. We didn’t call the police, but he was caught soon anyway.”

Steph is silent for a moment. “He probably never got the help he needed. But at least he ate a decent meal!”

Source: Blick