I am a member of Santa Rosa Lodge #53 and I’ve been following your DMC newsletter for a while now. In particular, your most recent communication of September 30 resonated very strongly with me, as I reflect back on some of the events that have transpired of late within our Lodge and how they seem to fit quite well into the above concept/idea (“the stool”), that you continue to highlight in your newsletters. And please know that I’m certainly not trying to be self-serving with regard to our Lodge in bringing an awareness of its endeavors to you, as I realize that there are many Lodge’s who are strong in their membership and diligent and focused when to comes to what they attempt to accomplish as a fraternal organization. So with that in mind, I share with you – with a degree of humility of course – some of what’s been going on at our Lodge recently.
Regarding the charitable aspect of our Lodge, we recently made a donation (actually, a few) to a local organization located here in Santa Rosa – “The Living Room” – that provides daytime support services to homeless and at-risk women and their children – they were indeed very grateful for our support and we are considering taking a tour of their campus in the near future. We are also planning a golf tournament fundraiser to be held the last Saturday in October at a local course, which will be a benefit for the “Save the Children” foundation; we were actually able to secure some radio air time to bring attention to the event – which is being broadcast in several different areas around Northern California. This will, of course, not only serve as a way to hopefully bring in a number of participants – but it will also bring attention to our Lodge specifically, within the context of this charitable pursuit.
We regularly receive solicitations from other, local charitable organizations (such as our local Food Bank) and while we certainly understand that we must exercise some level of financial prudence with the money that we consider sending to those who request it of us – we are definitely open to at least considering what assistance we might be able to provide to these groups/causes. We offered our Lodge Hall for a fundraising event in late August, for a woman whose ex-husband tragically killed himself and their 2 young children (they actually lived not far from the Lodge) and not only was a fair amount of money raised – but our participation was made reference to more than once within our local newspaper. And while our interest in helping out the situation certainly wasn’t driven by a desire for media attention, I would submit that having that take place is definitely a positive reflection on Lodge 53 and further, the Odd Fellows as a whole. And of course as you may already be aware, we sent a donation of $10,000 to the Texas Grand Lodge on the heels of Hurricane Harvey, to assist in their relief efforts with regard to their Houston-area Lodges – and we recently received a letter from them expressing their significant gratitude and appreciation for our gesture, along with feedback that the money was able to go very promptly to those Lodges impacted by the storm and its aftermath and was indeed put to good use right away.
As to the Social “leg” of the stool, we have been having monthly events for some time now – and not only has the attendance has been very strong (I believe that we had close to 100 people at last week’s “Oktoberfest”, for example), but we continue to find that a number of those who come to the events are not actually Odd Fellows. Which isn’t to suggest that we don’t get a strong showing of Lodge members – but obviously, the word is getting out that what’s taking place at our Hall on Pacific Avenue in Santa Rosa on the 4th Wednesdays of the month is worth taking the time to be a part of. To that end, we’ve been able to bring in some new members from these events and we see no reason that this trend won’t continue. Also, just to circle back to the Charitable/Community-minded leg of the “stool”, at these Socials we always try to have one particular local organization represented and acknowledged – either in having a representative of the charity present (and if that’s the case, we ask them to give a brief overview of their organization), or at the very least, we make sure that some of the money that we collect – for a raffle for example – will benefit the organization. An example of this would be an organization that sent a couple of representatives to a Social not too long ago, one which provides housing for homeless youth, as well as a number of counseling and support services. So again, we’re certainly enjoying each other’s company and enjoying the events themselves – but we are very conscious of our Mission while planning and executing them.
One note – there are many people who are instrumental in putting these wonderful gatherings together – but frankly, I’d be remiss if I didn’t specifically acknowledge 2 of our members in particular, Laurie Crum and Karen Amandoli – who are very often the driving forces behind the success of these events (and of course, there’s also a special “shout out” to Gundy Feil – who worked for weeks as to the food preparation for the last week’s Oktobertfest – and it was very good food, no doubt!).
And so that brings us to the “History” leg of the stool – and that is certainly an aspect of our Order that is important within our Lodge; we have many pictures throughout our Lodge that go back a number of years, as it’s been a part of Santa Rosa for a long time. And we are mindful of this history and we understand its significance. We also have regalia that has been in the Lodge for some time and we’ve even come across Minutes of meetings from long ago (such that they were hand-written, on a type of paper that probably doesn’t exist anymore). In fact as a somewhat lighter example of this facet of our Lodge in particular, I just recently learned that there are some who believe that our Lodge might actually be haunted – and while that may or may not be true (and mind you, I don’t consider myself to be any kind of an expert on the Paranormal), it stands to reason that if there’s any accuracy to this claim – it serves as another example of a “rich” history (after all, you generally don’t hear about newer buildings – or those which don’t possess an historical significance of some kind – as being haunted, right?). But again, we have an awareness of our history – and absolutely a respect for it.
In closing, I want to sincerely thank you for taking the time to read this. I’ve been an Odd Fellow for 20 years now and I can say without question that this time at Santa Rosa Lodge is about as stimulating and enjoyable as I’ve experienced in that 20-year span of being a part of the IOOF. I also believe that I can say with a high degree of confidence that many of our members feel the same – you can actually “feel” the dynamic of our Lodge as being a positive one, for what that’s worth. We are aware of the need to continue to grow our membership base – and I think that having a positive outlook on being a part of Lodge #53 will help us in doing so – after all, if you believe that you are a part of something special, then you are more likely to be an advocate of it as you share this belief with others who you come into contact with. I also feel its important to acknowledge those within our Lodge who have been members throughout the time when perhaps the above wasn’t the case, who nevertheless persevered in making sure that Santa Rosa #53 continued to be viable as a Lodge and important within our community – we certainly stand on their shoulders.
Perhaps one of the best examples that I can share with you as to the manner in which our Lodge is moving forward in this positive direction is at last Friday’s “Bowling Night”, which had in attendance 16 of our members. Not only did we all seem to be having a really good time – but as I was looking out over the 4 lanes that Lodge #53 occupied (and indeed, bowling shirts – along with nicknames – are definitely being considered), what struck me was the fact that we were all truly enjoying each others’ company. Yet, we were/are certainly a group of people who are “on paper” definitely different from each other. Our oldest bowlers were in their 70’s – and yet they were interacting with the youngest there, who are in their late 20’s/early 30’s; there were men, women, folks who work in drastically different fields from each other, those who very likely share different Political belief’s, some who ride motorcycles regularly – and those who wouldn’t do so for any reason whatsoever (that’d be me, in the interest of full disclosure) – but yet, none of that matters because we were having fun a lot of together. Frankly, I can’t think of a better example of the true spirit of Friendship, Love and Truth.
Sincerely,
Doug Caesare
Santa Rosa Lodge #53