The Free-Fall Chronicles
Peter Coyote created a grand story of Things Past, weaving his amazing
Digger tales into a book that he published in 1998 called Sleeping Where I Fall.
During the two years he worked on this project, Peter sent us preliminary
versions of chapters that dealt closely with the Digger family. During
this stage of the work, Free-Fall
Chronicles (as Peter called the work initially) was a collection of Digger stories organized around the people and groups who
made up this movement. Intimate, revealing, prophetic, scathing, and downright humorous
— all are apt descriptions of these stories. In the Kaliflower commune, we recounted Digger
tales over our shared lunches and dinners. We took notes of these oral traditions, and
typed them up as "memcons" for the archives. Ringolevio was important for us
because of the adventures that Emmett had put to paper. Yes, a common criticism
was that Emmett "sauntered where
everyone else walked" but we could overlook that flaw of Ego for the sheer Truth of
the book. Now, Peter has given us another installment of that same Truth, something on
another plateau. Here we can see the digger movement not just through the author's eyes
(as Ringolevio was) but from others' as well. Coyote has made the diggers a
"multiuser dimension" (as they say in cyberspace.)
Peter would appreciate hearing any feedback. If you like the stories (or even not),
please be sure to drop him a line. I've put up a Feedback Form
to send your comments.
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Free-Fall Chronicles by Peter Coyote
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