Chapter 5: Film Fodder

Kat asked, “What about the tenth house on our circle of homes. I know we believe that someone else might join us, but has there been any thoughts about it, or who, or timing?”

Ty shrugged along with Dave. He responded, “There are no plans for it, but it easily fit in the design of the Circle. Owen will be the official owner of the home, but it’ll remain mostly unfinished inside awaiting residents who want to pick their decorating and appliances throughout. If you have any ideas, please talk to Owen, us, or introduce us, or whatever is appropriate.”

Dev sounded out, “Yes, I have an idea, at least for the short term after it’s finished.”

Several people said, “Tell us.”

“We make it a guest house. We do minimum finishing, maybe not even all the rooms, but enough so that it’s livable and a little better than a room at the Motel 6 out by the Interstate. We don’t even finish all the rooms or floors or whatever.

“Since we’ve formed our group and feel about each other the way we do, the only visits from relatives has been when Alice and Julie’s parents showed up, and we know how well that turned out. All the other visits with relatives or parents have been us leaving here and going to them; what if they want to come here? After all, we are in a warm climate and winter will be here not too long after we move into the Circle.

“When relatives came to any of us heretofore, if they stayed with us, we just didn’t participate in our Circle activities those days. It was easy. When we’re all together, especially if sex is occurring on the patio or in the pool, it’ll be kind of difficult to avoid some kind of situation.”

Kat said, “Do you want to announce to your parents – or relatives – our lifestyle? My parents might react worse than Alice and Julie’s.”

Alice said, “Just to clarify, our parents have no idea of the grand scale of things here. They were upset because Pam lived with us and apparently, I made love with her. We only hinted about Owen.”

Julie said, “I sent them a change of address card, but never got an acknowledgement. I don’t know whether they think we’re all having sex or not. On the one hand, I don’t care. On the other, I hope that they feel the need to reconcile someday. Oh, and on the third hand, they would positively go ballistic if they knew the full scope of the Circle, including that Alice and I make love.”

Sean said amid some modest laughter, “On the fourth hand, I do like the idea of a guest house until someone comes along to really move in and be full-fledged neighbors.”

Clarisse had been mostly quiet, but she asked, “How do you invite somebody to join us? ‘Hey, we’ve got this little swinging cohousing project and we trade partners all the time, wanna join us and fuck all the time because we have one house available?’”

Dave said, “Be a little subtle, Clarisse; more like, ‘Do you like to fuck? Oh good, then we have a deal for you.’” There was more laughter.

Christie said, “You make me think about what will happen if word gets out more about our little venture. Lots of people already know about it, plus we’ll have tradespeople in and out all the time. It won’t be a secret, and I’m sure our lifestyle will leak out some way. During the weekdays or when workers are coming, we’ll need some way to put the word out to cool it in the public spaces.”

Ty said, “Let me address that. For one, we will be a private gated community. We’ll all have remotes or transponders for the gate down by the main road. If we’re having anybody up here other than the mailman who’ll stay on Circle Road, we’ll want to know about it so that we can warn everyone to dress and behave appropriately. We have a security firm looking into cameras and other alerting devices.

“If some individuals or groups, say a church or something, wants to picket us, they’re welcome to do it, but by law they can’t block the access to our property and they must not trespass. Dave, Owen, and I talked about this, and we’ve decided to also put a single lane road out the back to the neighborhood to our north. It’ll be gated like the other, but with even greater security. We want to hide and disguise it even. It’ll be for real emergencies, as you might predict such as when our entry road is blocked for any reason.

“The official story we are giving out now and will propagate in a press release when some of the homes are completed will be that we are a circle of close friends who have formed a modern-day professional commune. Who knows, maybe some of you will even start to grow a few things on the outer acreage around the project to help solidify that earth mother and sky father image.”

Roy said, “I apologize for missing some of the early meetings, but won’t the banks want to know exactly what’s going on. After all, they’ll be the real owners of most of our project.”

Ty shook his head; “No banks are directly involved with us except in the float loans we have now. The long-term bank is Owen. Our mortgages, as we complete the process and get ready to move in, will be with one of his subsidiary financial corporations that amazingly specializes in funding and propagating cohousing projects with various missions. Realize that we are small change compared to most of his business dealings. He mentioned that we get lost in the round-off error in some of his financial statements. Just to ease your conscience, he will be getting an appropriate return on his investment.”

The questions fell by the wayside as some of the men and women coupled up and started to get romantic with one another. Alice’s moans from having Dev suck on her taut breasts shifted the direction of the after-dinner discussion. Kat going down on Jack also seemed to disrupt things.

Grace motioned Christie to join her, as the two of them started to kiss and make out with a very willing Dave. Bathing suits and monokinis soon disappeared, and then some serious sexual play commenced on the various chaises and futons on the patio. Kat soon had Jack fully entertained as she lay back on one of the picnic tables and he moaned in satisfaction in front of her as he sank his meat into her. It was the first union of the two. Dori had decided that Roy deserved some serious attention, something he didn’t often get to do with her despite the two of them working in the same office.

Owen sat in a casual chair in Ty’s living room. Dave, and the other board members for The Circle Cohousing Project sat nearby, along with most of the spouses or other singles in the Circle.

Owen spoke, “I have a proposal – a request really – that I wanted to put to you as the board for our ongoing project. I would like your serious consideration, but I don’t want special consideration either because I once owned the common land the project is being built on or because I am the banker. In this instance, I am just another one of you with a request for consideration. It involves use of some of the land.”

Ty was presiding over the meeting. “The floor is yours, and we understand your desire for common treatment.”

“Thank you. I’ll be blunt in my proposal and then elaborate. I would like to build a paved runway and helipad along the southern edge of the property. The runway itself would be about fifty or sixty feet wide in a one hundred eighty-foot clear-cut swath, and would be 8,000 feet long. Almost all of it would not be visible to the Project because of the curvature of the terrain, but obviously noise from my plane landing or taking off would be heard, as well as any helicopter noise. During a busy week, there might be four to six small jet operations or four helicopter operations in that area. More typically, there might be one or two a week, and some weeks there would be none.

“I would also like to build a hangar in the southeast corner for the plane and potentially a copter; it could hold other aircraft as well, but I do not plan further craft for now other than the one I have. The hangar would have two studio apartments in it for my pilots if we’re planning a very early morning departure for some reason. I also might buy a smaller private plane, but that’s kind of iffy; the hangar could accommodate that, too. If any of you were inclined to become pilots and want to use the runway or hangars, it would be available free of charge. The building might be visible to part of the Project, but I would like to plant conifers and some tall palms between to make the building relatively invisible from the residential part of the land and to soak up some of the acoustic energy from the planes.

“I have checked with the local authorities and I can do this providing The CCP – you all – approve. Zoning is not a problem, and only a few neighbors might be concerned, but one of my staff has talked to them to alleviate their issues.

“Having the plane, helicopter, and home within a few feet of each other would be a huge convenience and time saver for me. I could do some of my work at home, and be ready to travel in a flash. We’d do some aircraft maintenance and fuel storage there, but that could be serviced by way of the back entrance and very infrequent.”

Owen stopped and looked from person to person to see their reaction.

Ty turned to the board and others, “Questions? Concerns?”

Heather asked, “Will the area be fenced? I’m concerned about children getting into mischief or being in the way down there.”

Owen nodded, “Except for the perimeter fence around the entire property that is now being installed, I hadn’t planned on any, but I could add that. My feeling was that we were far enough away from the homes that younger kids wouldn’t be in the area. As for older kids, my personal experience is that a fence won’t stop them.”

Heather said, “OK. I guess I’m fine with that for now. If it became a problem, you’d be willing to add a fence?”

“Absolutely, and I’ll put that in writing, say contingent upon a request from CCP board.”

Alice asked, “Will there be another access road?”

Owen said, “Oh, I forgot to mention this. Between the Project and the hangar area, I’d want a narrow road, just wide enough for one car, but more likely to be used by a golf cart or two to shuttle any luggage and me to the plane. This path could be the same one we talked about as the back exit from the property out to the other neighborhood in the north behind us; it’ll be gated and secure at all times. One would have to drive around the end of one runway to exit, but with property signage that shouldn’t be a problem.”

“Will there be lights?”

“Yes, but they’ll only come on based on motion sensors around the hangar, or runway perimeter lighting triggered by a plane’s radio. Both will go off after a few minutes. Both are also related to safety and security.”

Dave asked, “What kind of plane?”

“It’s my Gulfstream 650LR. It’s new, with relatively quiet engines. I don’t have a helicopter yet, but I was thinking of a four or six-passenger model like a small Bell. So far, I’ve been renting the copter as I need it but it has mostly been spur of the moment. Last year I rented a total of six times, so there’s not much use at this point in my life. I’d just want the option should my daily routines change.”

Sean asked, “What about costs to the Project?”

“There should be none. The Bennett Foundation and Bennett Enterprises will lease the land from CCP, so there’ll be a net positive cash flow to the overall treasury. The figures are on the other side of the one-page plot plan I passed out. It’ll amount to $5,000 a month above any taxes or other city assessments on the property that we’d pick up, especially for the hangar. We’d handle all legal fees to establish this as well, both CCP’s as well as our own.”

There was general nodding around the room.

Ty said, “Only a board vote is needed for this decision, but I would like to get a broader consensus from everybody here. To do that I want to pass out two different colored pieces of paper: beige for non-board members and white for board. I want a secret ballot as well since we all know and love Owen, but this is kind of a unique situation.”

Alice jumped up and helped distribute the half sheets of paper to everybody along with an odd assortment of pens and pencils. She then collected everything in a large Tupperware container.

As they did, Owen again emphasized that he only wanted consideration as a normal citizen and not based on anything else he was doing to help the Circle. He stated that he could continue to drive further to the main airport.

Ty, Dave, and Kat went off to the dining room to look at the ballots. The others heard laughter at one point.

Ty led the contingent back into the room with a smile. He looked at everyone and then at Owen, “Mr. Bennett you have your miniature airport by unanimous agreement.”

Owen looked surprised. “Thank you one and all. I promised to make this have as little impact on the Circle Cohousing Project as possible. If you have any concerns or questions, please come and see me.”

A month later, the secondary road from the Project to the rear exit on the property was cut into the landscape and paved. A month after that some heavier earth moving equipment showed up to create the level strip through the land for the runway. Paving and such took another month. A prefab hangar was installed in the fourth month. Poof! Instant airport. But other things happened during those months elsewhere on the property.