Wow! this is the first issue of the 25th Anniversary Volume of Letters from CAMP Rehoboth and its parent organization CAMP Rehoboth. We will be celebrating this momentous occasion all year long, culminating in an amazing “silver” gala and street fair in October. In the meantime there will be multiple opportunities throughout 2015 to celebrate our anniversary, including house parties and special events like the recent CAMP Rehoboth night at Mixx—thank you Ginger, Courtney, and staff for a beautiful evening!
As can be seen from the photo on the cover of this issue of Letters, 32 happy CAMPers had the good fortune to be a part of the first CAMP Rehoboth cruise—this one to South America. Murray has summed up it up nicely, I think. “We were expecting fabulous,” he says, “and we got spectacularly fabulous!” In his CAMPmatters column he talks more about the cruise, and adds a bit of his own perspective about CAMPing out “at the end of world” as the residents of Ushuaia, Argentina like to call their city. For us, the trip was a once-in-a-lifetime adventure that we won’t soon forget. A very special thanks to Annette and Rick Stellhorn at Accent on Travel for making it happen, and for taking such good care of us—Annette even flew down to Santiago, Chile, to get us safely to Valparaiso and aboard the ship! With the huge success of this trip, I’m quite sure there will be more CAMP Rehoboth travel adventures planned for the not so distant future.
When the CAMP Rehoboth Board of Directors convened for its first 2015 meeting, we welcomed two new members: Mark Purpura and Kathy McGuiness. Both of them come to us with unique skills and connections that make them right at home with our other talented Board members, each of whom is deeply committed to CAMP Rehoboth. Mark, as almost everyone in our community surely knows by now, is President of Equality Delaware Foundation, and was the author of the marriage equality legislation passed in Delaware in 2012. Kathy is currently serving her fifth term (though not consecutive) term as a Rehoboth Beach City Commissioner. I will also say that our organization is blessed by the extraordinary amount of work our Board members do in their service to CAMP Rehoboth and our community. Over the course of 2015, each one will be hosting a small event in their home in celebration of CAMP Rehoboth’s 25th anniversary. Talk to them about the details.
As always, the recentCAMP Rehoboth chorus concerts at Epworth United Methodist Church filled us with pride! And the Winner Is…was the name of this year’s concert, but the real winners this year were the members of the audience. Singing award winning songs, the 80 plus members of the Chorus made us laugh, made us cry, and inspired us over and over again. Accompanied by David Zipse and under the direction of Doug Yetter, the CAMP Rehoboth Chorus continues to be amazing ambassadors for our organization. If you missed the recent concerts at Epworth, it’s not too late: the CAMP Rehoboth Chorus will perform And the Winner Is…one more time, on March 29 at Delaware Tech in Gerogetown. Tickets are available on the CAMP Rehoboth website at camprehoboth.com.
When Murray and I moved to Rehoboth fulltime, 25 years ago, January was a slow time to be in Rehoboth. In our early years here, we used to let our dog off the leash on Baltimore Avenue because things were so slow. Years have passed since we tried something like that, and now, while it’s not quite “the city that never sleeps,” there’s a lot more to do than there used to be. At the Community Center alone, meetings, Chorus rehearsals, art, and even performances of Love Stinks by members of the DC Gay Men’s Chorus Cabaret kept things lively. With our many 25th anniversary activities on the horizon, 2015 is sure to be an amazing year for CAMP Rehoboth.