Summer Vacation, Anyone? Start Planning Your Magnum Opus!

Ok, Thanksgiving is over. Let’s just skip to summer. Or at least start planning for it.
One of our dreams is to someday spend part of a summer in Shin Pond, Maine  and finally produce the magnum opus that we were meant to. If you also have a magnum opus in your constantly postponed future, maybe Shin Pond should be your dream too, because there is a place there that was specifically designed to help you finally get your idea out of your brain and on to paper, or into pixels, as the case may be.
The 300-acre “Camp Muse” is the site of a Summer Retreat Program for writers, scholars, artists, educators, and others whose work focuses on animals. Open from July 1 to early October every summer, it is designed to provide an idyllic atmosphere to encourage scholarly, cultural, and practical projects relating to animals, and to provide a site for “enhanced productivity” on such projects. (Ah, “enhanced productivity.” It sounds so doable, doesn’t it?). Stays of between 2 and 4 weeks are preferred, and you do have to get yourself (and your family if applicable) up there, and provide your own food. Companion animals are considered on a case by case basis and with certain restrictions, in view of concerns about the safety of local wildlife.
If this sounds as lovely to you as it does to us, think about submitting an application to Dr. Bernard Unti at The Humane Society of the United States, 2100 L Street, N.W., Washington, DC 20037, by fax to 301-258-3077, or email to bunti [at] humanesociety.org. There’s no set application form, but among the things he would like to know are: relevant information on your overall project; the specific work product that will be produced during the retreat period and details of its likely outcome or application; scheduling preferences; and two professional references.