Posted by upsidedown on November 4, 2009, 12:44 am, in reply to "I'm planning to go to Joanne's workshop in April...Anyone else?"
To another...
I attended Joanne's workshop in April of 2008. I am so excited that you will be attending! There are no words to describe that weekend for me. I learned so much about myself that I do not believe I would have learned otherwise.
One of the biggest things that stands out to me is how free and open I felt that weekend. It was the first place I was truly able to be honest 100% the whole time. I hadn't been 100% honest for almost a year by the time I went and walking into that room, knowing that we were all in similar situations and I had nothing to hide was just the BEST feeling ever. It was also eye opening for me as I became acutely aware of how much I did not want to continue living my lies for much longer.
I could go on and on...but I won't. Logistics...
I flew from LAX to Philadelphia airport and took a cab to the city. I actually stayed at the Courtyard downtown which was a beautiful hotel. Many of the attendees did stay at the hotel Joanne recommends and I wasn't terribly far from there. You definitely won't need a car. I walked just about everywhere and took TONS of pictures. It is a beautiful city. Oh, and you'll know when you're in the gayborhood..no doubt about it. Just check out the street signs.
I took the Thursday night red-eye and checked into my hotel around 7:30 on Friday morning. Luckily they had a room available so I slept for a couple of hours, got up, had breakfast and made my way out into the city. I just wandered around for most of the afternoon (after I bought a REAL coat...wow, it was cold for this socal girl). I kept to myself Friday night even though a big group of AJers got together and had a peaceful evening of room service and a movie. The red-eye turned out to be a good thing because I got myself adjusted to the time pretty quickly. All day Saturday was workshop with a break for lunch. We met a few of the GFs at lunch that day. Saturday night we all split up at had dinner at a few local restaurants and then most of us ended up at Sisters. Sunday was workshop again until lunchtime and lots of us ended up having lunch together again.
I can tell you right now - I made friends for life that weekend. That experience cannot be matched. One of the women and I spent most of Sunday afternoon together in a local Starbucks... we keep in touch and I have such a soft spot for her.
Wow, anyway, I'm sorry I made this so long. I could just keep typing about that weekend..it made such an impact. I look forward to hearing your experience...
take care.
jen
--Previous Message--
: I'll be talking with the H tonight about
: making plans for me to go to this workshop.
: I was wondering who else plans to go?
:
: Sassy
:
