Well, here I am. It's about 8 AM here in Guerneville, and I leave in about an hour back to SFO where I catch my flight to Michigan. Bummer. This weekend has been tremendous! I will sorely miss all the guys here -- their spirit, their energy, and their sexiness! :)

Yesterday began with breakfast as per usual, and then we moved into a session on leadership. We discussed the three types of leadership -- "Steward" leaders; "Inspirational" leaders; and "Servant" leaders. I'll post pictures of the "post-it" notes that included examples of each. It's 8 AM and so I can't quite process right now. But I remember one thing: if these are my options, I am certainly an inspirational leader. While the other types do not always feel strongly about "right" and "wrong" -- or rather, that they are able to distinguish clearly between the two -- I feel passionately about deciding between the two. I'll add more about this typology later.

What was perhaps the highlight of my day -- and weekend! -- was my participant-led session yesterday on my upcoming research project in bottom identity in gay men. Over a dozen guys came to dish about what they thought being a bottom meant and how I could best frame my questions and overall project. We had a fabulous discussion about sissy tops, pushy bottoms, and pleasure. These guys really pushed me in new directions, especially since my past audiences for this research proposal have been non-gay-male academics. While they can give great feedback on methods, not many folks who I talk to at Michigan can give me much insight into bottoming!

This discussion bled out into the smoking patio afterwards, and I continued chatting about bottoming with Jason Riggs from Stop AIDS Project. 7 out of the 28 participants here this weekend were from Stop AIDS, and I was honestly nervous going into this weekend that their organizational politics might overtake the weekend. This hasn't been the case. I also was a bit worried because I wrote an editorial in the Bay Area Reporter a little over two years ago that pissed off a lot of prevention agencies in SF. So I'm never sure how those folks will percieve me / interact with me. I was really blown away by my conversations and interactions with Jason. I think I often have a hard time seeing past organizations and their internal politics -- and talking with Jason demanded that I do just that.

Jason and I also instigated a caucus session yesterday about social marketing, in particular trying to think about doing assets-based HIV prevention. That is, doing positively framed prevention that encourages healthy behavior, rather than deficit-based prevention which blames gay men for their problems or tells them *not* to do something we see as unhealthy. I think we came to a concensus that good prevention needs to be happening outside the bounds of organizations -- whose hands are tied by funding and politics. This might mean doing guerilla marketing campaigns with sexy / daring imagery that could never be produced by The Department of Public Health. I think we just need to take matters into our own hands.

My battery is running low, so I'll have to cut the rest short. But check out this video of me and the Sisi tribe (which I talked about yesterday) doing our mantra! How fabulous!

So sad I have to leave in an hour. I can't believe I have to leave this beautiful place in the mountains to return to a cold, dreary, Michigan. Ugh. I'll miss these guys!

xoxo

Trevor