Part One

Our summer let in South Parade, north Oxford, was nearly up, with no longer-term living space on the horizon. The prospect of our having to go our separate ways before really starting was a real possibility. And then, at the last minute, one of my contacts came up trumps.

Debora was a rather thin, wan, late forty-something at a guess, lady. She was a regular walker with the local Ramblers' Association at weekends, as was my father. I occasionally tagged along, and it was through these walks in the Oxfordshire countryside - which served for many as social events as much as nature activities - that I knew Debora. 

Canadian by birth, Debora had for reasons unknown washed up on the fair shores of southern England, where she now owned a house in north Oxford. Boasting four floors, it was far too large for her and Michael, her twenty-something son. Then we turned up: would we like to take on the top two floors?

The estate agent bit. The outer door led into a hallway. To the right was Debora's flat, on the ground and semi-basement floors; an interior stairway led straight up to our own completely self-contained dwelling place. On the left the bathroom, then up a few steps to another bedroom. Since Dave seemed to need his own space more then the rest of us, he took on this small room, where he could strum his guitar, listen to his little transistor radio, and turn the lights on and off whenever he wanted. 

Up another few steps, and the main bedroom was on the left. Mottie, Liberty, and I shared this one space, sleeping on mattresses arranged on the floor amongst cupboards, drawers, laundry basket, and a large writing table, invariably occupied by Liberty's texts on Egyptian symbols and ancient languages.

The upper floor comprised a spacious living room and a smaller kitchen-cum-dining area. All in all, it seemed the perfect base for us to get work, raise money, and purchase that sweetly-dreamed-of property in the countryside.

Tree-lined Polstead Road was located in one of the quieter, more pleasant parts of town. It was home to doctors, academics, professors, affluent families, a sprinkling of better-off students - and a bunch of freaks out to create a different world altogether.

Debora - or 'D' as she became known, following a suggestion from Liberty - seemed broadly sympathetic to our aims and ideals, and we began our residence on amicable terms. 

We paid her £28 rent weekly; that's £7 each. A reasonable sum at the time, but no giveaway either. There was also the option of paying a reduced rent - £5 each -, plus two hours' work in the garden. As summer dissolved into autumn, we enthusiastically took up the second alternative. Anything to reduce the bills, and it was a good way to work together, getting used to each other's style of doing things.

Working with the land was our thing, and for a while Saturday mornings were a-bustle with the activities that typified large back gardens in autumn. As the end of the year approached, however, complaints could be heard from both sides: about our unsatisfactory standards of work from D, and our own gripe about being worked beyond the statutory two hours. The gardening sessions fizzled out in mild yet palpable acrimony, and we just paid up.

Part Two

Gardening continued more happily on our own vegetable patch. We managed to rent an allotment close by - ten minutes' walk - and soon a selection of vegetable goodies was on its way. Self-sufficiency in this urban working environment was out of the question, but we could keep our hand in, learn new skills, and usefully supplement our diet. 

Self-sufficiency in vegetables was not, for me, an idle dream. I had done it already - well, kind-of. A few years back, I had run the experiment: could I keep myself in vegetables (potatoes aside) for an entire year from my village allotment plot, along with any edible wild plants from the local hedgerows? And I had succeeded. OK, it wasn't always Michelin-star cuisine, especially in late winter/early spring, when tiny-going-woody carrots and curly kale were the only things still available. Carrots and millet one day, followed by kale and millet (I ate a lot of millet) day after day after tedious day...

One vegetable which grew readily on the north-facing Oxfordshire slopes was kohlrabi. A common sight in Germany and elsewhere, kohlrabi was viewed more like some extraterrestrial visitation in village England. The other allotmenteers had never seen anything like it before. Neither had they seen anything like me: a twenty-year old, long-haired type, enthusiastically growing vegetables in the village.

Mottie and Dave were dedicated and motivated vegetable gardeners. Weekends, and evenings in the summer months, would see them out there regularly. Less so me. I did my bit, but meditation, Tibetan mysticism, and Castaneda sounded their siren calls....

Diet in the commune was vegetarian. Mottie, Dave, and I all came along as seasoned non-meat eaters, and Liberty was happy enough to go along with things. Less commonplace than nowadays, vegetarianism was nevertheless adopted by a large portion of the 1970s counterculture. Cruelty, pain, and needless suffering to animals was a hallmark of the kind of society that we intended to overcome and replace. Giving the animals a bit of a break, especially those kept in horrific cramped and artificial environments, was the least we could do.

Meat-free 1970s-style was more limited than it is today. The plus side was that synthetic meatless food was not yet an option; it had to be from the ground and the farm. For us, this meant moderate amounts of dairy products, plus lots of brown stuff. Brown rice, mountains of seriously brown wholemeal bread from the healthfood shop in nearby Summertown; lentils, beans, buckwheat (a bit expensive); plenty of vegetables, especially our home-grown ones; fruit; and sacksful of potatoes.

Cooking rotas were drawn up. We were all passable chefs, and the dietary regime was wholesome and tolerably tasty, if unspectacular. Potatoes were a thing, especially when it came to Mottie's culinary creations. The thick Brummie accent of the commune's youngest member was unable to hide the fact that, dig beneath the surface, and you would find pure Irish flesh and blood. And, true to form, the true Irish flesh and blood enjoyed an enduring love affair with the humble spud.

Whenever Mottie cooked, it was potatoes. He just couldn't get enough of them. There was one occasion in particular, when I was really craving a change. Mottie's name was on the cooking rota, and I put the question: "What's to eat tonight, Mottie?" His eyes lit up, and he rubbed his hands together in ecstatic glee. "Potatoes!" he announced triumphantly, taking the lid off the largest pot in the kitchen to reveal an enormous pile of the starchy things, boiled whole, skins on, nothing added, nothing taken away. I turned a sickly yellow at the sight. I don't think he noticed. 

Images:

Top: Polstead Road recently. We lived in the top two floors of the first house with large bay windows on the left. Worth a fortune nowadays.

Below: Mottie serves up another pile of potatoes, captured by Caravaggio.