Sect Life -Modeling and Moving

Dear Gentle Reader,

It is difficult and potentially life changing for me to explore the topic of where I come from. I know that the interweb is monitored for content related to "the sect" and that content deemed negative can result in unwanted attention.  For that reason I have chosen to not include the names of any people associated with this story, or to name "the sect" outright. Please understand that my relationship to some members of my immediate family could be effected by the way in which this piece is spread online.  It's not easy to write this piece so thanks for reading and for respecting the lives of those involved!  These are my memories of growing up there and I am sure that others remember things differently and view the group trough different eyes.  This is a cathartic exercise for me that I am choosing to share with all of you. Enjoy!
-Marvin

I was a child model.  It's understandable if you're skeptical when you consider my less-than-glamorous appearance, but it's true, and I have the pictures to prove it.  No I wasn't rocking sweet kids outfits in the Macy's catalog.  I was repin' preschool toys for Commune Playthings, the business arm of the The Sect.  In fairness I was a pretty cute kid, and since kids there spend most of their early lives in daycare playing with those toy anyway it wasn't much of a stretch.  I appeared in semi glossy early '80s catalog pics astride a scooter/trike thing next to my best friend Lawrence, mounted on his own wheeled steed.  And on hands and knees playing with the latest wooden dump truck, or on an indoor climbing gym being pushed down the slide by a kid named Colin.  In each shot I am wearing some sort of overalls and my blond hair is shaped in my Dad's signature Amish cut.   Unfortunately my modeling career was short lived which I sure had nothing to do with my obvious talent and good looks. I bet that the powers that be didn't want me to get to into being photographed, since that might make me unsuitable as a follower.    Such was the strange but true and often wonderful world I grew up in.

If you're new to this tangent on E Pluribus Marvus then let me briefly catch you up.  I came into this world in upstate New York as the first of six kids born to two members of a religious commune.  I have debated calling it a cult (Google it) but as an olive branch have chosen to stick with The Sect as a working title.  I struggle to describe the place to the uninitiated so here is how another kid that grew up there lays it out.  Sorry no names used here.  Anyway this is how they described it. "It's is a christian commune, not part of any major denomination, but rooted in Anabaptist teachings.  They currently have about 2,500 - 3,000 members, who live in groups of about 300 with locations in the U.S., Germany and Australia (and more).  The group was founded in 1920 by a young theologian Eberhard Arnold and his wife Emmy.  Members have no money as all basic needs are provided for.  Families live in semi-communal houses, all meals are taken communally, and all members work on the commune, few go to college and children are schooled in the community."  Well put! If you're wondering what it is try watching M Night Shyamalan's "The Village".  Its some of that minus the explicit use of monsters in the woods to keep people in line.  There the monsters appear more as worldly ills than dudes wearing costumes (spoiler alert).

So yeah like I said, I was born in the very late '70s (Gen X baby!) and spent the first few years of my daycare childhood at Woodcrest, a "village" about an hour and a half north of NYC. My Grandmother was around as well as my Mom's sister, her husband and a couple cousins.  I have pictures of us playing with our new wooden toys under the Christmas tree when I was two or three. Things were cruising along nicely when one day when I was about four out of the blue we got traded to an arm of The Sect in Pennsylvania.  And that might have been the beginning of the troubles.

The Sect in Pennsylvania is in an economically depressed area of the state a stones throw from West Virgina, and about an hour  (extra and) and a half from Pittsburgh.  Unlike the hilltop world of Woodcrest, New Meadow Run is just that, a grassy valley with a creek running through it.  Everything about life there except for the people and the topography was exactly the same as the old place, so it wasn't much of an adjustment.  Yeah more daycare time!  Don't get me wrong, daycare there is pretty sweet.

And then out of nowhere we got kicked out.  By that I mean that my mom or dad (OK, it must of been my Dad) did something bad, so we as a nuclear family suddenly found ourselves living on  a rapidly declining farm not far from the compound in rural Pennsylvania. Who did what and to whom has never been revealed to me. And it's not as if you can file a freedom of information request with those folks and get some old documents that detail my parents's transgressions.  More then likely my folks (Dad) said something prideful or pushed back a wee bit on some directive from above and that was deemed to be an affront to the unity of the group; so we were sent to our rooms.  I have asked my folks on multiple occasions what happened to get us a timeout, but they quickly turn into Donald Rumsfeld dodging questions from Congress about the Iraq Invasion.  Man you talk about filibustering!  My guess is that my Dad, since he is the rebellious one,was asked to do something like change jobs or move to Pennsylvania for God's sake, and he gave some push back.  That's all it takes to get a timeout for an attitude adjustment.

Lets pause the story here for a minute to talk about the psyche of your average Sect member.  The saying "there is no I in team" might as well be tattooed across the foreheads of every man, women and most of the kids in the group.  In fact the whole structure of the place is held together by the one principle that self always takes a back seat to the whole body.  Every person has a place in the system, the machine, and one selfish act or attitude starts to threaten the unbroken circle.  The whole thing would collapse in about three days if people started thinking for and about themselves.  Thus when the members hold "votes" on doctrine or day to day policy that have been presented to them by the leadership, they always unanimously vote yes. Every single damn time!  So you can understand how seriously they take keeping people in line and all moving in the same direction,  And you can imagine how quickly members fall on their proverbial swords and welcome disciplinary action in order to expedite their fall from grace and swift return to their spot in the system.  Nothing is more lonely then being on the outside of the group.  Hell back then if you were bad you had to wear different clothes then the rest of the members, and take your meal at home instead of in the dinning hall.  Yes even us kids knew when someone was a screw-up.  They might as well have been rocking a scarlet letter around their neck.

Back to the farm then.  I am sure my parents were in full blown panic mode at finding themselves on the outs. But me, I was tickled to death!  Suddenly me and my two siblings at the time were home all day with Mom, something that you don't experience as a kids growing up at The Sect. There when you hit six weeks old its off to the daycare center for ten hours a day so your mom can go back to her work within the community system.  You stay in daycare pretty much the rest of your formative years, basically until you got to high school.  So being home with Mom all day was a huge treat. Suddenly we were a normal American family.  My dad worked for a local construction company and we stayed home and played in the dilapidated barn and swung from on a tree swing in the old orchard on the property.  I remember my grandparents coming out for diner and taking Sunday afternoon roadies to a nearby water fall.  Normal huh?  One day a roofing crew came to the farm to re shingle the roof of the house. It was a warm summer day so most of them decided to forgo shirts.  Guess who spent the next week refusing to wear a shirt? And we pounded a lot of sliced tomatoes slathered in mayo during our hiatus since for once we could eat what we wanted, and my Dad is nuts about sliced tomatoes.  Life was great!

I have no idea if we were gone a month or six months, but it was probably about the length or the summer.  All I know is one day we moved back to the compound; or should I say we moved one step closer to the compound.  Really it was a house on a hill above the rest of the non sinners were we could transition back into group.  My Dad started working at the factory with the rest of the men, but my Mom kept us home and kept doing normal stay-at-home Mom stuff.  I mentioned earlier that back then they rocked different outfits from the rest of the group.  Specifically that meant that the women wore a different colored head scarf then the ones in good standing.  I don't remember what the men had to give up, maybe suspenders?  Which frankly would have been a welcome break.  And to be clear I was to young to remember if my mom really did go "scarlet scarf" during that time.  

At some point we moved back down the hill into a huge old hotel that most of the members lived in. There was no welcome committee or formal ceremony when we arrived.  I am sure my parents had some sort of official welcome back into their spots on the wheel at a members only meeting.  But us kids just slid back into daycare, learning to ride bikes, and me cracking open my chin in an attempt to ice skate. Needles to say my modeling career was never resuscitated.   

A few years ago I was in the area and with guidance from my uncle I found the old farm. The barn was leaning badly to one side, and the brick house was crumbling.  Old cars, bicycles and trash decorated the yard in the local custom.  No one I ever knew now called it home.  I'll choose to remember the place as clean, cheery and welcoming.  A nice place I called home for however long it was, and a brief glimpse of my families sojourn into the American Dream.