As a retiring member of the board of directors of Agur Lake Camp Society, I have saved a space for you.
The camp society is actively looking to recruit new board members to be elected at their AGM in April. Would you like to take up the challenge? As you will see from my story, there will never be a dull moment if you do.
Five years ago I became a joiner.
I had just moved to Summerland and felt a need for social contacts. I set about locating groups where I might feel at home.
I joined the Seniors’ Drop-in Centre, the Camera Club, a writers’ group and Agur Lake Camp Society.
Polio at 15 had landed me in a life-long adventure of pushing back my limitations.
Agur Lake Camp back then was planning a facility in the wilderness where people with disabilities could camp like they had never camped before.
At that point I was a bit disappointed to learn that it was just a plan, not a reality. I attended events on site and imagined what it might be like to be a camper there. I had barely made myself known to board members when I was asked to be on their board of directors.
They wanted me to work on a dream with them and to help them make it happen.
I had some useful skills and experience. I was a photographer and a writer.
I also had experience with managing websites.
And I had lived my life with a disability, so I saw things from a unique perspective.
All those skills were put to work immediately, and as that was happening I noticed that dozens of people with other skills were there making their contributions also. I found myself caught up in an ongoing series of meetings, events, work-parties and plain old-fashioned socializing.
I am turning 80 this year and am finding it increasingly hard to keep up the pace of my first 15 years of retirement.
I would love to continue the ALCS activities that have become so much of my life, but I no longer have the energy to do it. So I have made a decision to resign from the Board, comforted by the knowledge that someone out there will replace me and get to enjoy the sense of accomplishment that working for ALCS has brought me.
The camp welcomed its first campers last summer.
In this transition from a plan to a reality many volunteers are still needed, including people with totally new skills and abilities. ALCS now has a new office.
Volunteers are needed to man the office. ALCS now has a site by a lake with two cabins and a dry camp ground ready for summer operation.
Planners and promoters and trail builders and money-raisers and shovel wielders and paper pushers are all needed. If you want to learn more, click on Volunteers in the top panel of our Home page.
Also on that page there is Job Opportunities under Agur Lake Camp. Right in the middle of Home page is a red Camp Registration button which will explain all about getting to camp this summer, if that is your goal.
Don’t forget the opening I am leaving for you on the board of directors. I promise you, if you take up my challenge, it could be the most exciting ride of your life.
Keith Dixon is the website manager and a retiring director of the board at Agur Lake Camp.
