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Cattiness (or, more precisely, fear) had been left behind. The dinner conversation was surprising, better than I had experienced in ages. I’d imagined a meal of vegan slop accompanied by twig-and-bark tea, but the reality was much kinder: pork rotini, vegetables roasted to a crisp, cheese-laced mashed potatoes, and ginger-lemon water. “I’m Lion.” “I’m Wow.” “I’m Longevity.” “I’m…Brock?”Īfter intros, we plopped down for dinner.
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(Members of the hippie-like Radical Faeries, who strive to define queerness through spirituality, paganism, and a lack of deodorant, are frequent visitors of Groundswell.) We stood in a circle, joined hands, and introduced ourselves. Most of them were return visitors, some using their Radical Faerie names. All types of men, ranging in ages, body types, ethnicities, and socioeconomic backgrounds, were on display. Any ghosts of a kiddie past, however, are banished by the following inscription on one of the doors: “This stall reserved for hook ups.” There’s even a little creek cutting across the land.įormerly a children’s camp with the innocent name of Camp Rancheria, the land’s prepubescent past reveals itself in the communal bathrooms that still feature childlike pastel colors and a pint-size trough urinal. There’s a fire pit replete with a stage for a nightly cabaret. Ten little cabins, each lodging up to eight people, decorate the tree-studded land. When Special and I finally arrived at the camp, located in the emerald-hued town of Yorkville, my eyes and mouth went agape at the scene before me: It is, indeed, a camp in the manner of Wet Hot American Summer or Meatballs. They joined in throughout the weekend, acting as guides to the property and leading workshops on homesteading skills. There are also a handful of permanent residents who have flocked from various lifestyles in various places to help establish this new community in the woods. (I paid $100 for the weekend.) Though it’s technically open to folks of any persuasion, a majority of the institute’s visitors-and every one of the 20 attendees of this retreat, titled “Queer Forestry Camp”-are queer men. Groundswell mostly serves as a retreat center, hosting short-term experiences like this one using a sliding scale payment system. “It’s not as burner or hippie as you think,” he reassured me. During our ride up, I peppered him with questions about what to expect.
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When he arrived, Special turned out to be Kevin Clark, an attractive young professional who works at a local medicinal marijuana company and had rented a sleek 2015 Mazda for the weekend.
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Visions of a creaking VW bus piloted by a Gandalf-cum-Liberace character puttered through my head. It took a second to register, but someone named Special, it seemed, was going to act as the Virgil to my Dante.
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“Special will be driving you up,” it read. Could a gay community possibly thrive long-term outside of a city’s boundaries? With my mind open and my pecs needing some ax work, I headed up to Groundswell to find out.Ī few days before I left, I got an email from the fine folks at Groundswell. Sure, there are vacation communities like Provincetown and Guerneville, but these always struck me as short-term getaways, not permanent living places. After a weekend there, I’m still not sure.)Īll the film festival flicks and overwrought gay literature I had ever consumed suggested that being in a gay community meant living in a big city. (Or maybe that’s all BS and Groundswell is just an excuse for outdoorsy gay dudes to cavort in the woods. Besides the fact that queer rights and environmentalism generally sit together on the left side of the political spectrum, the idea of people with lifestyles slightly outside the norm decamping to some remote piece of land has historical antecedents. What does being gay have to do with going back to the land? DeVries argues, convincingly, that LGBTQ folks have long experienced injustice and oppression in the same way that Mother Earth has experienced hardship and abuse. Inspired by similar communes around the country, Groundswell was conceived in 2014 by Kyle DeVries, Jim Montgomery, and William Stewart, all three of whom are gay and veterans of communal life. You won’t find a two-for-one well-drink night or a rainbow crosswalk for miles. But it’s also a budding queer community where people come to live, an attempt to build a gay ghetto outside of a metropolitan area.
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Groundswell offers a chance for city dwellers like myself to break free of Castro stereotypes and, if nothing else, play woodsman for a weekend.
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Here, campers learn everything from how to cut down trees and build swales to how to don drag and participate in better group sex. Such is life at the Groundswell Institute, a two-year-old, 200-acre eco-village in Mendocino County dedicated to creating a queer space that overlaps with environmental activism.