A-Camp September 2012 Recamp #1: We Absolutely Started The Fire

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Tuesday, September 11th

Team Camp (minus Vikki, Fonseca, Ali, Brittani, Sara Medd & “The Talent”) prepares, prepares, prepares.

prepping the step & repeat (photo by alex)

II. Be Prepared

Robin, Camp Co-Director/Photographer: Pre-camp was one of the greatest ideas we’ve had yet!

Laura: Saying Pre-camp makes me think of the word “pre-cum” which makes me shiver, so instead I’m going to call it Team Time. It gave me space to settle in before the roller coaster of joy that is real-camp began.

Marni, Camp Co-Director: We had teams prepping craft materials, assembling gift bags, organizing registration materials, folding tshirts, making the step-and-repeat (which looked amazing), setting up tech equipment, decorating cabins, and generally doing anything and everything to get the place ready for all the campers the next day. It was so much more relaxing to have that time to get ready.

Rachel: This is sort of what I imagine Santa’s workshop looking like, except colder and with elves.

marni builds something (photo by crystal)

Crystal: Carly and I had spent the past few weeks brainstorming cabin-decorating and gift bag ideas for our Thundercats cabin, and so being able to finally put those plans into action was super exciting. I got my craft on and spent the entire day in Wolf Lodge, making t-shirt stencils and posters and mix tapes.

Carly: Most of Tuesday was spent decorating cabins, realizing we were running out of tape, carrying things, and asking Team LA to bring things with them.

Daniela, Unicorns Counselor/Intern: I spent a long time trying to find literary quotes involving unicorns. Annika and I then cut eleven paper unicorn heads and planned cabin decorations that involved way too many markers and tape. There was a shortage of tape in this mountain.

Rachel: Co-counselor Geneva and I meditated deeply on what it really meant to be a Jetpack and/or Jetpacker, and tried to arrange cabin decorations and plans for cabin initiations accordingly.

Carmen: Since the Alpine Meadows staff made it clear that this time really was Bear Time, I was already freaked out about the possibility of being killed by a bear and demanded that Cee allow me to exact revenge on that feeling by making a bear stencil we could all use for tee-shirt cutting and stenciling. Cee is a genius and the Badass Bear was thus born that day.

the bear stencil (photo by cee)

Riese: Since I was on like six panels, I had like seventeen meetings about panels.

Laneia: I did my very best to organize supplies and find enough tape and markers to satisfy the masses!

Laura: I wrote all the campers’ names on name tags and told everyone about the real good ones; was introduced to King Taco by Annika, the Mexican food whisperer of southern California; and voted on which of Cee’s designs would become the official A-Camp crest.

meredydd displays the A-Camp crest

Rachel: We stuffed gift bags with bandanas and love notes and tiny presents.

Carrie: The tote-bag + binder assembly line – never were so many queers so efficient!

Whitney: We hand-wrote everyone’s name, organized campers by color and cabin number and doled out colored bandanas accordingly. I was on a team with Morgan and Mary — Morgan and I danced a little bit, I got to hug Mary, who is the sweetest person ever.

gift bags w/design*sponge newsletter

Rachel: Once the bulk of cabin planning had been done and panels had been planned, it was revealed that Stef had a jar of apple cinnamon moonshine, so that was an exciting development, and there was much rejoicing.

(photo by stef)

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III. The Campfire of Tears

Carly: Tuesday night was one of my favorite moments of camp: the Campfire of Tears.

Robin: We sat around outside of Eagle in a big circle. Marni and I welcomed the staff and chatted briefly about our expectations for them and our schedules and then asked the staff, “what does A-Camp mean to you?”

Megan: I could barely handle how real this was.

Stef: I talked about joining Autostraddle at the very beginning, how I’d definitely drifted from the site over time but how the rush of feelings I’d experienced at the first A Camp gave me a strong sense of my community and made me want to be 100% involved with the team as much as I can be from here on out.

Crystal: I opened my mouth and all of these words tumbled out about how Autostraddle turned my life around and I guess I hadn’t acknowledged how true they were until that moment.

Daniela: I had this concrete, short story I wanted to share about what A-Camp meant to me but by the time it was my turn to talk I was filled with so much excitement and gratitude all I managed to do was squeak “you make me feel beautiful.”

Stef: This took several hours and by the end everyone was hysterically crying, especially when Riese presented Whitney with a check to use towards her honeymoon.

Riese: At dinner I’d asked Whitney about what her and Jessie had planned for their honeymoon and she said they were trying to scrape together enough money to drive down to Boston from New York for a weekend. In my head I was like, This won’t do. We just had this campaign, and after everything they’ve been through…

Carrie:  I seriously still cry when I think about Riese giving Whitney that check for her honeymoon.

Whitney: While we were sitting Riese stood up to give a speech and gave me a gift for my honeymoon — it was totally unexpected and it bowled me over completely and there were so many tears. I’m getting married on October 6 to my fiancée, Jessie, and the whole thing has been so hard and heart-rending. My relationship with my family has been difficult and tenuous for so long, and we’ve gotten a lot of negativity for getting married, for being gay — I was estranged from my parents for years and Jessie’s grandparents disowned her. Getting the gift from Riese was lovely, mainly because I had never experienced that kind of support for my relationship until then — the kind of “we love you and are so happy you’re getting gay married” support.

Jessie and I didn’t know if we had enough money to go on a honeymoon, and we hadn’t planned one yet. We were thinking about something small — taking a drive out of town to a bed and breakfast or taking a train down to Boston for a weekend. With the gift, we could plan a honeymoon that was just that — a honeymoon. It wasn’t an event we had to pick because it was the cheapest or the most convenient. We can choose where we want to go now, and we can choose where we want to stay, who we want to see. And that is the best gift I have ever received.

Riese: I think that’s when Alex started almost-crying (ALEX NEVER CRIES) — just to think where we were in 2009, broke, and that now we were here and were able to do that for somebody. All night there was so much people talked about that I didn’t even know. It was possibly the most profound experience of my life.

Rachel:  In order to process my feelings I clearly had to share a paper cup of whiskey with Laneia and Megan, don’t tell Adam.

Alex: We don’t see each other in real life very often, so I feel that these things are super important for team-building and also crying while saying “we’re doing it, you guys” which is a very popular activity at pre-camp.

Laura: One of my favorite parts of Team Time was the campfire, obviously. The crying campfire.

Stef: It was so emotional that by the time we made it all the way around the circle, even little Alex Vega was a bit teary.

Malaika: If I recap this properly, I’ll probably start crying again, so…that’s all you’re getting from me.

Crystal: I cried the entire time but then I think we all did.

Robin: We cried quite a bit.

Carmen: I don’t know how many tears are left in my body after this, to be honest.

Laneia: We just cut out our hearts and showed them to each other. It was life-affirming. Mountain-affirming.

Rachel: It sounds super corny (because it was!) but also felt like the most important thing I had done in years. I had already known that for many of us, both staff members and readers, Autostraddle gave us a family and a home. But it was heartrending to be reminded of how many of us call Autostraddle their only family and only home, and how central to our lives an imaginary slumber party on the internet has become. It was an opportunity to be so grateful and so happy that we’ve finally made it here, that we’ve even managed to make a camp on a mountain for all of us to be together, a physical space for us to belong in — and that we could share that space with you, too.

Cabin 18 – magic: the gathering (photo by cee webster)

Stef: Just when we eventually finished our Most Lesbian Campfire Of All Time and headed back into Wolf Lodge, Haviland, Sara Medd and Sarah Croce arrived. They must have been super confused by all the sniffling, smeared mascara and weepy, dramatic hugs.

Riese: Gabby made me cry again after the campfire too!

Marni: I think it really helped bring us together and remind us why we were there, what A-Camp means, and how lucky we all were to be a part of this.

Riese: I want everybody who comes to camp to feel that way, too. That’s the big idea.

Robin: Standing there Tuesday night listening to the staff responses on what A-Camp meant to each of them solidified my belief that our love for each other and for our readership will always guide each decision we make. And because of this, I don’t believe we can ever really fail. We really all want what is best for each other and that was a very powerful thing to learn. I have so much gratitude to the staff of A-Camp for donating their time and energy once again for this very important experience!

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NEXT: The first day of camp!

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Riese

Riese is the 40-year-old Co-Founder and CEO of Autostraddle.com as well as an award-winning writer, video-maker, LGBTQ+ Marketing consultant and aspiring cyber-performance artist who grew up in Michigan, lost her mind in New York and now lives in California. Her work has appeared in nine books including "The Bigger the Better The Tighter The Sweater: 21 Funny Women on Beauty, Body Image & Other Hazards Of Being Female," magazines including Marie Claire and Curve, and all over the web including Nylon, Queerty, Nerve, Bitch, Emily Books and Jezebel. She had a very popular personal blog once upon a time, and then she recapped The L Word, and then she had the idea to make this place, and now here we all are! In 2016, she was nominated for a GLAAD Award for Outstanding Digital Journalism. Follow her on twitter and instagram.

Riese has written 3058 articles for us.

184 Comments

  3. I just so happen to be wearing my A Camp t-shirt today because I needed to feel…I don’t know…maybe just feel something? And now I’m reading this and actually shouted RAINBOW WARS aloud and felt all excited when I thought about tug of war and stomping on people’s balloons and now I’m smiling. So, obviously my A Camp shirt (and A Camp) are magical.

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  5. i forgot to mention this but i am sure i told much of the staff: when i was an angry little adolescent at summer camp in middle-of-nowhere pennsylvania, my camp had rainbow wars only they were called the OLYMPICS and all the colours were different countries and you had to cheer 24 hours a day including mealtimes until everyone was hoarse and miserable and you had to do awful sports all the time and when i didn’t want to do those things, the counselors screamed at me the way people being paid to take care of children should never scream at anyone. i went to that camp every summer, so after begging in the office to not have to participate, i learned that i could hide in the tack room of the camp’s stable with a kitten and a discman and read my little kurt vonnegut collection for three or four days, skulking out once in a while for mealtimes and sleeptimes. i was not very popular, so nobody ever noticed i was missing.

    i was NOT INTO THE IDEA OF RAINBOW WAR AT ALL and when i mentioned this to robin, she told me “oh, it’s going to be SUPER SCARY.”

    instead rainbow war was super fun and helped everybody band together and fight the patriarchy and smash balloons!
    AND i got to be co-counselors with morgan which is the luckiest thing anybody has ever won.

    team polite forevs.
    i miss you guys.

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  7. oh god, you took a cuddle puddle picture! I think a just had a mild anxiety attack. thank god it’s a well-behaved one… (a lot, and I mean A LOT of feelings happened after the staff reading but..smokers’ circle love, yes…)

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  10. oh my god I miss camp and all your shiny faces.

    Also, I’ve come to embrace the fact that I am essentially a mobile bar.

    Alsox2, can I get an Awomen about having ice this time around! Praise LJ!

    AVENGERS ASSEMBLE!

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  12. You guys are the best ever and god dammit it might take me YEARS but I am going to come to A-Camp sometime and you’ll all be disappointed by the fact my hair isn’t rainbow any more but I WANT TO FEEL ALL THE QUEER LOVE so much. You’re all beautiful.

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  13. So many feelings! Mel I love your face, Katie I love your photos, Mel I love your face, Laneia I love you and Riese and your initiation ceremony is the best and I tell myself the code all of time and!!!!! And reading about the before we got there, so happy that it was good and happy and not too stresful for you guys.

    THANK YOU SO MUCH FOR CAMP.

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  15. This makes me positive that, come hell or high water, i will be at the next A-camp. It will be the perfect way to celebrate finishing my Peace Corps service/returning to the States/getting to be a full-time queer again. May cannot come soon enough.

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  18. me and my cabin straddled chairs in front of riese and alex for our straddling addiction. it may not have been original, but from our viewpoint it was surreal! little rascals 4evs!

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  20. so many feelings! also MAY MAY MAY MAY…y u so far away.
    continually checking flight rates and already told my dad I will not be at what feels like his 10th wedding (-celebration, not the actual thing) on the 25th of MAY MAY MAY MAY MAY

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  23. The first thing I said when I walked into Wolf for registration was “I’m home!” It amazes me how fast camp becomes the norm. Readjusting to the real world takes so much time, but flying across the country and climbing up a mountain to live with queermos from the internet just feels right. The people feel right.

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  26. I think Robin is a genius because the rainbow wars clearly brought us all together. Just read the comments on every single post since camp! I can’t wait to see what the next wars will be like :) It will be hard to switch up the teams though! Purple team will forever be my people :)

    *hunger salute!*

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  27. I was having such an awful day… it’s getting cold here and all I want to do is hibernate, but this recap made everything so much better! I miss camp like crazy.

    Ever since I was a little kid, I’ve wanted to be thrown up in the air by a parachute. I got to do this during the color wars, and it was basically the best thing ever. Even though my feet went way over my head, I wasn’t scared at all, because a cluster of lovely people were there to catch me. (This is probably a metaphor for camp as a whole.) Seriously, you make dreams come true.

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  29. Tonight I passed the derby assessment I thought the time off for A-Camp might cause me to fail, and now I am fully mins passed and I belong in that community of awesome (50% queer) women that is starting to feel like a family, and then I come home and there is a recap of my other community of awesome (~100% queer) women that felt like a family too.

    Today is a really good day, you guys, is what I’m saying.

    And booking September A-Camp in the depths of despair as something to look forward to / cling on to was an excellent decision, because sometimes it is six months after the world fell apart and you can’t believe how well everything has worked out. And I miss camp all the time.

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  34. Idk how to feel about having two pictures of me on the internets in which I cuddle/spoon people…proud, I suppose. Two years ago, I would have never dreamed that I would be doing this kinda thing. AS, you are the magic I needed in my life.

    SAVING $2 A DAY FOR THE NEXT CAMP!

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  35. Lately, I think of life as Pre-A-Camp and Post-A-Camp.
    I wish I could put into beautiful words what this queertopia in the mountains meant to me, but I can’t, so I’m glad you can.
    A-Camp was full of love of all kinds, where you could cuddle for the fun of it and TRULY be yourself.
    After camp, I understood the true meaning of “You Do You,” and I did.
    A week after I came home from camp, with my new-found queer support, I came out to my homophobic dad.
    I love you, A-Camp, and every single person I got to share this experience with.

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  38. I really love that Grace and I tricked everyone into thinking the lighting at the campfire was somehow magically installed by the two of us.

    Alpine installed it. Sorry everyone.

    OMG I WANT TO GO BAAAAACK! THUNDERCATS, HOOOO!

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  41. Y’know… I’ve missed people and places in my life, but not the way I miss A-Camp. There was just something about this simple life where people got along, you were fed at such and such time, people discussed stuff, and so on and so forth. These feelings are coming back hard.

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  42. “I was ushering campers to their cabins and trying my best not to grab them and scream WE’RE SO GLAD YOU’RE HERE WE LOVE YOU. Instead I just carried their luggage.”

    MEGAN I really wish you had done that.

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  49. i have so many feelings i can’t even begin to process. i am so in love with my THUNDERCATS (HOOOOOOO) cabin i can’t even start, and i want to hug Carly and Crystal so hard i might burst. Also, my big dumb face appeared so many times in this recap i want to die. Robin! If you see this, please send me a larger version of the photo of me photo-bombing the Misfits, because it looks like it might be magical. I’m the giant blonde mess in the tiny picture of the rainbow war photobooth collage!

    YOU GUYS I WANT TO BE AT CAMP FOREVER OMG

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  50. SARA MEDD you were the best with the gift bags.
    Did you get Lina’s and my “Du hast wunderschöne Augen”-note? Because you saying that to me was so amazing, I just had to blush and giggle stupidly.

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