Rebuilding Community, Joyfully
A guest post by Grace Oedel
Intro by Anya Matanovic
Last month, I had the joy of hosting my dad, Milenko, at my home in Manchester, Vermont. Since we live on opposite sides of the country, our catch-ups are usually limited to short Zoom calls—30 to 60 minutes here and there. We do our best to touch on all parts of our busy lives - family, work, the world’s crises, etc - but the magic of being together in those days really came in the interstitial moments. Not just talking about the big things, but discovering the small, unexpected and, often, hilarious moments in our conversations.
One highlight was traveling up to the greater Burlington area, where he led a one-day training for the team at NOFA-VT (Northeast Organic Farming Association of Vermont). The day was full of questions, creativity, and laughter. Grace Oedel, NOFA-VT’s Executive Director, later shared: “We left filled up: buzzing, hopeful, and inspired. Even those of our team who don’t consider themselves community organizers found his insights immediately practical and energizing.”
NOFA staff after their day of training with Milenko
When we asked Grace what made Milenko a good fit for their team, she shared the reflection below. It’s a timely reminder that, in the face of so much uncertainty, we must remember how to laugh, and why it matters. I was humbled and honored to be in a room with so many creative minds, and I’m grateful to have witnessed people who aren’t just talking about the hard things, but out there doing them.
Rebuilding Community, Joyfully
By Grace Oedel
I met Milenko early in the year at a retreat for folks working in social change–focused organizations. On the first night, I sat at dinner with him, admiring this badass artist and community builder who had a magnetic warmth. I didn’t know it then—only night one—but Milenko would soon reveal himself as the person I’d spend the week following around: nuanced insight, boisterous songs, and incisive, connective jokes spinning off him like whey from butter in the churn.
An artist originally from Slovenia, Milenko has devoted his life to helping communities heal across difference, conflict, and rupture by collaborating on large-scale art projects. He focuses on deep listening for transformation, and watching him hold a group conversation is magical. He draws out even the most reticent speaker with perceptive, gentle, generous questions—but better: he truly listens to the answers. He seemed genuinely curious about what people would share, never assuming he already knew.
Milenko is a person with a gentle steadiness that I long for. As I tend to do, about five minutes into our connection I posed the following:
“Okay, so… to be honest, it all feels pretty bleak and heavy to me right now. What do you think we need to do to actually help create the world we long for?”
Milenko took a beat, smiled kindly—with a touch of mischief—and said,
“Grace, I wonder if we just need to dream up much funnier stories!”
Thus commenced my week experimenting with the medicine of laughter, largely doled out by Milenko and James (another dear mentor/friend/teacher/rabble-rouser who had invited me to the retreat in the first place).
Laughter serves as a needle to pop illusions. First: the illusion of power. Ursula Le Guin wrote searingly,
“We live in capitalism. Its power seems inescapable. So did the divine right of kings…”
If authoritarian actions are meant to freeze and terrify us, then sharing our most daring, joyful, funny futures is a powerful counterpose. These stories of our dreaming endear us to each other. They move us out of fight-or-flight and into the realm of possibility.
Oh, you say there is nothing we can do? And yet—we are laughing with joy even now, dreaming up the future we are building.
Laughter also helpfully pops our own egos. In one of our retreat circles, I shared that I had been struggling with the feeling of desperately wanting—and failing—to do anything meaningful to stop climate change. I shared how panicked I felt thinking about my children growing up in a ravaged world. Everyone listened deeply, nodding, sending me empathy.
Later, over dinner, Milenko and I were talking about how to cultivate irreverence, and why laughing at ourselves and our situations matters. I reflected on how seriously I often felt about the climate catastrophes around me—how they unmoored me, how they woke me in the night.
Was it possible to hold this more lightly?
If so, how?
Milenko (gently, kindly, in his dear accent and with the true care he had already shown me) quietly wondered:
“You mean, like how you think you alone can stop climate change? How that’s somehow on your plate, and the rest of us are just here to watch?
It’s… it’s honestly… a tiny bit funny of an idea.”
I started smiling. Then laughing. Then releasing, catharsis washing over me like waves on the shore of a useless ego trap.
The alchemy of laughing made space for me to actually hear what he was offering. Of course the idea that I’m going to stop climate change—especially on my own—is patently ridiculous. Some bizarre white savior superhero movie bullshit.
I need to let that go, ASAP, if I’m going to be of much use.
As David Whyte writes,
“Your great mistake is to act the drama as if you were alone.”
Laughter is the all-too-often missing ingredient in this much-needed recipe for change—the salt in the soup that allows the rest of the flavors to sing.
“What is the boldest, most wildly joyful future we could dream up?” is a question I’ve heard before.
But far better: Can we even make the road there joyful? Playful? Beautiful?
As Bill Coperthwaite writes,
“Beauty is our birthright. An absence of beauty is a sign of grave danger.”
Milenko makes every place he goes more beautiful—and helps others remember that they can, too.
I know from parenting tiny children: if you try to win them over with serious commands, you're doomed. But make it a game? Make it a joke? Make it joyful?
Watch them fly to put on their boots and coats.
All humans are more motivated by joy than by threat or doom.
So, a question before me now, after watching the salute, preparing to help my community resist any immigration raid attempts today:
How can we turn toward irreverence—toward laughter—out of commitment to the possibility of something different?
About the Author
Grace Oedel is the Executive Director of the Northeast Organic Farming Association of Vermont (NOFA-VT), where she leads efforts to support resilient food systems and vibrant communities. A writer, farmer, and facilitator, Grace brings a deep commitment to healing work that connects people to land, purpose, and one another. She lives with her family on a small homestead in southern Vermont.