How a Queer Campout Showed Me What EVERYWHERE Could Be

By Zach Walz

Throughout my teenage and adult life, I never really questioned whether or not I fit into a box. I identified strongly as a gay, cisgender man, and never thought I was anything else. It wasn’t that I didn’t know there could be a different reality—I took queer theory in college and learned a lot about the spectrum of gender and sexuality, long before it was a common dinner table topic. I led the charge to bring in Kate Bornstein, a pioneer transgender activist, to speak at my small liberal arts school. I loved enlightening folks who didn’t know about the natural occurrence of intersexuality, or the numerous examples of gender and sexual fluidity in other species on earth.

But still, I never experienced gender dysphoria the way many of my trans friends described, so I never questioned this identity.

Discovering Dance and Freedom

I was a late dance bloomer—I discovered the joy of moving my body later in life, in my mid-30s. One of the events that caught my eye was a queer campout in the woods that centered music and dance. A close friend told me it was “indescribable” and something he would never forget. My curiosity piqued, I decided to attend two years ago.

When my friend said it was indescribable, he wasn’t kidding.

A Week Without Masks

I spent a week completely disconnected from the outside world. No cell service, no internet. Just queer folks being gloriously, unapologetically themselves in the middle of nowhere. Folks with every color, size, shape, presentation, and identity you could imagine. Within one hour of arriving, I felt 100% safe. I fully, completely let my guard down. It might have been the first time in my life I’d done that (aside from at home with my husband).

I thought I had life figured out—I had a successful corporate career, was married to my soulmate, had a tight-knit community of friends and family, and was unafraid to try anything new. I was able to accomplish all of those things in part because of the privileges I was afforded as a white, cis gay man.

But until I attended the campout, I didn’t know that a small part of me had been performing the entire time, and wielding that performance to my social advantage.

I had learned to modulate my queerness depending on the setting—a little less flamboyant in professional spaces, a little more palatable around family, always calculating how much of myself was safe to show. I thought this navigation was just survival, that everyone did it. But at the campout, I realized: what if you didn’t have to?

When you strip away the performance of the real world, the code-switching and careful navigation of who you can be where, magic happens. People show up with their full energy. They think expansively. They create fearlessly. They love openly. And I learned to do all of those things.

I learned to explore parts of myself that I didn’t realize I’d been afraid to show. I presented the way that I wanted to on any given day, I danced the way that I wanted to in the moment, I was present for the connections that developed, I saw the world with the awe and wonder of a child. And for the first time in my life, I didn’t just feel gay, I felt queer.

What’s Missing in Chicago

The campout is truly a magical experience that can’t be recreated outside of that setting. However, when I got back to Chicago, I started to question—why don’t these safe spaces exist here?

Chicago is a beacon of freedom for so many LGBTQ+ folks across the country, and we have wonderful queer spaces—Queen on Sundays for high-energy dancing, alt-dance parties at The Baton Show Lounge on select nights, and various bars and clubs throughout the city. These spaces are vital to our community and have provided joy and connection for decades.

But there’s still a gap. Most of our nightlife options are built around alcohol as the social lubricant. And while there’s nothing wrong with that—I enjoy a drink myself sometimes—it means that people in recovery, those who are sober curious, or anyone who simply doesn’t want to drink that night have limited options for queer community and celebration.

When I came back from the campout, I kept thinking: where can someone go to experience that same uninhibited joy, that freedom from performance, without alcohol being central to the experience? Where can our community gather regularly in a space designed for genuine connection rather than consumption?

We need more spaces dedicated to being safe and inclusive for the entire queer community on a consistent basis.

The Moment Everything Changed

This year, when I attended the campout, I had what could only be described as a spiritual moment on the last day. I was step-touching to the disco beat, feeling the afternoon sun gently kiss my skin through the trees, when all of a sudden, storm clouds rolled in and the floodgates opened. A deluge ensued, the dance floor turned into a mud pit, and everyone around me turned their energy up to 100.

And they all radiated joy. I could feel it from everyone around me (and no, I wasn’t high). I felt pure bliss from experiencing music, movement, mother nature’s finest, queer community and shared queer joy.

Standing there, soaked and ecstatic, I realized: this is what we all deserve to feel. Not once a year at a campout, but regularly. Accessibly. In our own city.

On the long drive home, I couldn’t stop thinking about it. I texted friends from the campout, trying to capture the feeling in words. When I got back to Chicago, I sat down with my husband and told him everything—the rain, the joy, the freedom. “I need to create this here,” I said. “I have to.”

We spent weeks talking through what it would take. Sketching ideas. Debating whether it was even possible. And then, one night, I stopped debating and started planning.

Bringing This Magic to Chicago: EVERYWHERE

I have poured most of our life savings into bringing EVERYWHERE to life because we all deserve to experience this bliss. I’m not saying it can’t happen in traditional bar and club settings, or at dance parties, but the chances are much lower because you have a lot of folks escaping rather than engaging.

EVERYWHERE is meant to be a place where we connect, we celebrate joy together, and we fully feel free. It’s an alcohol-free, queer social space where you can show up exactly as you are—without performance, without code-switching, without the pressure to consume to belong.

Will it fully replicate a week in the woods with no cell service? No. But it will create the conditions for that same magic: safety, acceptance, celebration, and authentic connection. A place where the full spectrum of our community—trans, nonbinary, queer, questioning, young, old, sober, dancing, sitting, loud, quiet—can exist together without hierarchy or judgment.

An Invitation to Explore Freedom

To my straight friends: I’ve had a lot of you ask if you’re welcome at a space like EVERYWHERE. The short answer: Yes.

The long answer: think about the masks that you wear on a daily basis, and how your ability to live fully free is hampered by them. When you come to EVERYWHERE, leave those masks at the door. Find someone to make a connection with, and learn what it means to be free.

We queers have had to eschew many of society’s rules just by existing. I’ve found that this process can be more difficult for straight people because you’re more deeply bound by those same rules. I invite you to explore yourself in a way you maybe haven’t done before. To experience what it feels like when performance drops away.

EVERYWHERE is a queer space that welcomes allies who come with open hearts and genuine curiosity.

The rain at that campout washed away my hesitation. Now I’m building the space I wish had existed all along—the space my mom needed, the space our community deserves, the space where we can all experience pure, unapologetic joy.

Join Us in Creating EVERYWHERE

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See you at opening,
-Zach