A few nights ago everyone who is living here for the summer met up to discuss some issues we've encountered. We used the Restorative Justice method Gloria learned about in one of her classes and I felt like it was really effective.

Starting with Gloria, we went around and spoke about how various issues had been affecting us this summer. The biggest issue was the mess in our kitchen. Almost everyone had the same feelings about this problem. We feel like we can't use the kitchen. We feel like we can't have people over. We feel like we can leave our dishes out because everyone else leaves their's. Its a perpetual cycle in our house and no one is happy about it (even those of us who contribute). When it got to my turn, I expressed similar feelings of frustration and annoyance. But what bothers me most is that its a bad reflection of our our house, not only because it looks like we are slobs, but because ultimately, it demonstrates that we don't really care about each other. I know that it was no one's intention to be uncaring, but that's what really lies behind the constant state of mess. Ever since the house started getting messy back in September, the people who have been most negatively affected by it have told us how terrible it makes them feel. We've created system after system and had meeting after meeting with little to no results. Why is this such a pervasive problem?

I think its so easy to forget about how your actions affect other people, especially when things don't affect you in the same way. I don't like it when its messy, but it doesn't weigh down on me as much as it does on others. Its easy for me to forget that every time I leave behind a mess, I'm showing a lack of care for the people I live with.

We've all committed to supporting and caring and loving each other in this house and the mess doesn't demonstrate that at all. Once everyone had a chance to share, we starting brainstorming different solutions. We came up with several different ideas about cleaning but nothing really enforceable (who wants to be the enforcer anyways). Then someone mentioned that we still weren't solving the root of the problem which is that really, we aren't caring for each other. I said that I wished we could have a reminder so that its fresh in our minds when we are making messes that not cleaning up is hurtful to others. Gloria suggested we have a sign that said something like "This is hurtful" or something to that effect and then have another sign that would say "I'm Sorry." to replace the first one with once the mess had been cleaned. Jesse suggested that instead of those words, we have a heart to represent that cleaning up the mess is showing love to each other. What we ended up with is a double sided sign. One side has a broken heart and we'll place it on our kitchen table if mess is ever left out. The other side has a whole heart which we can show when the wrong has been made right. I really like this idea. No one wants to be the nagging house mate who is constantly asking people to clean up after themselves or complaining about how upset the mess makes them. But some of us need reminders simply because, frankly, we aren't being very considerate. This is a happy medium.

So, the meeting was a few days ago and since then our house had been pretty clean, the kitchen especially. It makes me look forward to making food (which is great because I'd been eating terribly before since I never wanted to use the stove or counters). But more than that, it makes me feel at peace in my home. I feel glad that my actions aren't negatively affecting my house mates any more and I feel glad that we can remove this huge cause of resentment from our lives and maybe start focusing on the reasons we got together in this house in the first place. This seemingly small thing makes me feel hopeful for our futures together. This restorative justice thing is a great tool and I know we'll definitely use it for whatever future stumbling blocks we come against.