I thoroughly enjoyed going to OUTWest's Boot camp last weekend. I felt like the experience was well worth the flight that I took from Northern California.

I first learned about the Boot camp during the San Bernandino leadership meeting that occurred in late July. At that time, I thought the event sounded like a good idea. As the event came closer and closer, I began to anticipate the event and I knew that I had to attend. When signing up, I had the opportunity to pick two out of four topics that would be taught on Day 2 of the course. I choose Field and Media, but I really wanted to chose all of them.

On Day 1 of the bootcamp, we all were welcomed with a nice breakfast and were then greeted with opening statements from the organizers of the event. The parts that I enjoyed the most about this day was the Campaign simulation, the Campaign Ads analysis portion, and Reverend Eric Lee. Reverend Lee's comments on that same-sex marriage movement can't exactly mimic the Civil Rights Movement of the past was on point with the hard lesson that the LGBT community learned last year.

As for the second day, I truly appreciate the time that Christine Pelosi took out of her weekend to come speak with us. Her point of making efforts to "do something", rather than trying to "be someone" really hit home with me, since it emphasize the fact that the main reason that we became activists was to help the common good.

I can go on and on how much I enjoyed the event. One criticism that I would make is that that I would like the event to have a couple more interactive sessions. There was a point on Saturday where the boot campers were sitting in the lecture hall for about 5 hours straight. I had some trouble focusing on the speakers after awhile. I would like to see this broken up a bit.

Despite that minor critique, this bootcamp was a great idea. For someone who has a great deal to learn about activism, and the desire to do so, this bootcamp provided me with many different opportunities to learn and network with my fellow bootcampers. I left the event feeling more motivated that ever to do the work that is needed to change enough hearts and minds so that the LGBT community can finally have equal rights.

Kudos to the organizers!