President’s Message for June President’s Message for June Happy Pride!
The theme of this message is The Three P’s.
The first P is for Pride. I’m writing this on Saturday, June 10th, the day of Boston Pride. Sadly for me, I’m writing it from Miami Beach, so I won’t be able to join in the festivities. I would like to take this public forum, however, to thank Jay for all his hard work in coordinating SGM’s presence at Boston Pride. I’ll be thinking of you guys all day today. (Really! J)
And Portland Pride is just a week away. Jeremy is doing an equally great job at coordinating SGM’s presence there. So if you aren’t able to make it to Boston Pride—and even if you are—I strongly encourage you to get yourselves up to Portland next Saturday.
There are many other non–Monday evening activities planned for the weeks ahead, so do keep an eye on the calendar in our Web site, which, as always, can be accessed by either http://seacoastgaymen.org/ or http://sgminc.org/.
The second P is for Photos. Due to James’s production requirements, this issue of Identity is coming out in advance of Monday evening’s board meeting, so I can’t report on what we will have discussed, but I can tell you that one of the topics has to do with picture-taking at Monday evening meetings. For years, Jeremy has been our unofficial photographer, and to my knowledge, no one has ever objected to this. I’m sure this is partly due to Jeremy’s well-earned trust and respect by every member of SGM, but partly also to his care in ensuring that those few men who don’t wish to have their pictures appear in Identity be not included in any shots that Jeremy takes.
Recently, another member Bill was taking pictures at a Monday evening meeting, and this issue resurfaced. I am convinced that Bill’s intentions were simply to help out Jeremy, as the latter was not in attendance that evening. Nonetheless, it did catch some of us off guard. So we shall be discussing the policy of picture-taking at Monday evening meetings. If you have any input, please get it to any board member. And although most of you will be reading this after Monday’s board meeting, I assure you the topic will still be open for discussion. If you’ll recall, one of my “campaign promises” was to ensure that SGM be a safe space for all attendees.
The final P is for Programming. I continue to be amazed at the quality of programs that Joe and Jay put on Monday after Monday. Yet I am dismayed by the lower attendance at all but potluck Mondays. My advice to all of you is to look at the calendar, find a program that doesn’t interest you at all, and then attend it! I guarantee you’ll be pleasantly surprised. As for myself, I don’t even look at the schedule, because I know that whatever is planned will be great. (Of course, the downside of this is that I sometimes neglect to bring anything to a potluck. Oops!)
So I challenge all of you to attend more Monday evening programs. And for those of you interested in attending board meetings (open to all), the July board meeting is not yet scheduled, but my guess is that it will be the second Monday of July. Check the Web site beforehand just in case, though.
Until next month, be out, be proud, and participate!
Carl