All Of Us was fucking awesome

So, it’s been a week now since All Of Us ended. Many of the people involved in the magic are off doing the ALC (AIDS Life Cycle) ride from San Francisco to L.A.. So, as I write the official report on the event about money and critical things I await the details to fill in those pieces on the other web site. (www.lgbtproduction.org)

The event opened on Thursday noon and went through Monday noon after Memorial Day. It was the longest weekend we attempted before. It worked out well for so many! The space at www.saratogasprings.com was absolutely perfect. We have just under 150 people come out and thank goodness we managed to just break even on expenses versus income.

A Great Week

There was a pop-up Jacuzzi party hosted by thee (in spirit) Whitney Houston on Thursday evening. It was a naked soirée in the hot water and it was fabulous. There were all kinds of wonderful human in the mix and the music was fantastic. The Jacuzzi was the most popular spot on the land at the end of any day – no wonder it was turning green by Sunday afternoon.

Each day progressed with a new layer of loveliness and unimaginable brilliance among all those who came out. There was so much love, uninhibited embrace, with no matter who was there or gender. We were blessed that our demographic did change on some level with a lot more women and gender non-conforming people that fit together and celebrated.

On a couple notes, there was a detailed waiver everyone signed when coming in and part of it talked about respecting other people and their boundaries. We did have a moment when someone was talking about trans-people openly with real trans persons just a few feet away and it was wrong and hurtful. We also talked about boundaries for consent and as it turned out someone did not heed that either. Someone was violated and we simply cannot allow those things to happen in our community. All Of Us is about unity and inclusiveness.

The Journey

The crown jewel of the event was the 30 foot long piece of this art piece going to Burning Man in 2017. Dan Reeves was the original visionary and his team of amazing humans who came out and set this up. It was celebrated every night!

It was part of the Art Garden that we had set up in front of the Heart Lodge along with Squares by Steve Dudek and Frames by www.visualsby3.com that was a great collection of installation pieces.

Friday night was a party at the art piece and the DJ’s sis an amazing job. The art was outstanding. The energy was awe-inspiring.

Saturday saw the majority of the workshops in all three tracks of the weekend while The Journey folks did live screen printing in front of the main Lodge. The Journey folks even set up a bar and served drinks as they did their magic.

• Mental / Physical Health and Self Care
• Acculturation and the 10 Principles
• Leadership

The workshops were amazing and well orchestrated. The information was invaluable. We shared some amazing ideas and performed some exercises that made our participation and community stronger.

Meal Time

The food was amazing as well. Thank you to Jose for another year of delicious offerings. While we may have fell down on some of the vegetarian options we will do even better next year. But happily everyone got fed and our food and beverage team did a great job in the end. We are grateful that Jose came up from Mexico once again to help us!

We did daily Brunch and Dinner with snacks in between. The kitchen team seemed to be able to take it more easy this year which I was very glad for.

They even served hot dogs and snacks at the Sunday Pool Party (SPF) with bacon wrapped around them and on buns. Event the veggie dogs had a veggie bacon on them. Someone was heard saying: “They are really committed to bacon.” Well, this is a burner event, right?

Thank you to everyone who helped with volunteering.  The weekend could not happen without you. While we had some paid positions, many gave their time and energy to make this event happen. Who profited from it? Well, no one did. All the money that was left over is being folded back into the community.

The Gate ran flawlessly thanks to an amazing team there. Exodus was went just as smoothly. It with a sincere and deeply held feeling of appreciation to everyone to helped in making the magic either by being there or getting us there.