Cob: Welcome Mother Nature

[Bob]

You have spoken to my heart. The ancient scriptures say "bread made with
love is sweet. Bread made without love is bitter" to paraphrase its wisdom.
Can we add, "a house in tune with life is a vital cloak that holds us in
Mother Nature's arms." A machine build house has all the life squeezed out
of it and often these days is filled with poisonous off-gassing adhesives
and plastic carpets, covers and curtains..

 Shouldn't every cob house have cavities for birds nests built into them. I
know my mosquito eating swallows would love that. Maybe the cliff swallows
would too. Could I invite an owl to come and liven up the night, and
morning doves to sing in the dawn and dusk. Perhaps you who have seen ants
and wasps as invaders have forgotten we homo sapiens may be the invaders
and they are just taking back a little territory.

When we learn to love the creations of Mother Nature we can sing in the
rain and catch the tingling snow flakes on our tongues like the hippo did
in our local zoo. We can liberate ourselves from the feudalism of
domineering machines and welcome gentle incursions of the wild creatures
around us. If my walls are 14" thick certainly there is lots of room for
squirrel and chipmunk burrows, too. What a joy it would be to wake up to
the happy voices of Nature's living creatures in our windows and walls. 

Cob is much more than a low cost way to build a strong and lasting house.
It is a bridge back to our ancient roots when our ancestors lived close to
the soil and tuned their lives into the seasons, and meshed their daily
chores with the living universe. Ianto Evens has made cob into cozy
cottages curved in all the walls like the trees and boulders near by. Sun
Ray Kelly has taken it further and sculpts buildings into pieces of art.
Many who build today add sculpted decorations to their buildings. To these
creative persons cob is an art form, a connection with the soul of life. To
them the building process is a living working community. All that is
missing is the singing that poured fourth from the spirit of former
peasants as they moved together like a great coordinated living.being
through their daily labors. Ianto's Welch blood must have flowed through
song. I just don't know him well enough.

When I build my house there will be no effort to keep out the wild
invaders. It may have bee hives and special cavities opening not just for
inside nooks but also openings to the out side of the walls. I can even
imagine bird nest cavities with little glass windows I can look through
from within the house to watch the hatchlings grow. 

Thank you Elke for awakening my primordial spirit.

Bob Luitweiler