Are you a Straddler with an urge to attend A-Camp this October but not very much money in those stylish pockets of yours? Well fret not, grasshopper, because today may be your very luckiest day! We’ve teamed up with Anna Kunz of Kreuzbach10 again, and together we are offering another bright and shiny campership!

Way back when in the now before the now, Alex introduced you to the glory of Kreuzbach10 and encouraged you to support their indiegogo campaign, raving that “Anna Kunz, the very driven creator of this endeavor, is basically doing what I would do if I had the resources, time, or even remotely the amount of motivation that she does: masculine clothes that are made to fit women’s bodies.”

The campaign made their mark ($7,500) and then some ($14,825) and you can now shop online for well-made shirts, hats, and bow ties from Kreuzbach10! Because queer community is the best, Anna Kunz wanted to show her appreciation for our collective support in a very tangible way – so she created the Kreuzbach10 campership! This campership is the same as others in that it is a free ride to A-Camp (travel costs not included) but the lucky winner will be the official Kreuzbach10 Camper and will be gifted a Kreuzbach10 shirt, bow tie and hat!

How can you apply? You’re gonna write a thing and send it to us. Here’s what Anna wants you to write about:

I strongly see Kreuzbach10 as being about empowerment and hope. The name ‘Kreuzbach10’ actually comes from the street name of my family home in Germany. When my father was young, he and his brother and parents were displaced and made refugees twice in political turmoil, losing everything but the clothes on their backs. There was a bit of a saga, but the short version is that they rocked up in this little village, had people treat them with kindness and generosity, worked their butts off, and built this whole new life from absolutely nothing at all. By the time I was a child visiting from Australia my grandmother was a fat old lady eating strudel. Their ability to come so far, from having so little is something that inspires me.

I guess it’s quite similar to what you in the USA would call the ‘American Dream’ but repackaged with my Australian-European slant on it. Many queers face obstacles, and some are even reduced to literally nothing in either the social/emotional/economic spheres, but my idealistic vision behind the label is that enabling them to feel good about their physical expression of themselves can create a flow on to other areas of their lives, its the shirt that gives you the courage to join a social group, ask someone out, sell yourself in a job interview… possibilities are endless.

So that’s what we’d like to hear from you — how feeling good about your physical expression of yourself gave you the courage to move forward in some area of your life. You need not express yourself as masculine-of-center in order to apply for this campership! Just speak from your heart.

If you grant us permission, we’ll publish the winning essay and two others on Autostraddle. If you’d rather not have your essay shared, that’s okay, we’ll ask you for permission first, and we’ll do that after Anna has made her decision so it won’t impact your chances.

So here’s what you do:

+ Email your short essay to anna [at] kreuzbach10 [dot] com by Tuesday, August 13th.

+ Anna will read your essays and we will inform the winner by September 1st, 2013.

+ Any candidates must be totally cool and maybe even enthusiastic about appearing on the Kreuzbach10 website with a photograph of you wearing your duds at camp with maybe a little paragraph about you.

Happy camping/writing! See you on the mountain oh-so-soon!

Before you go! Autostraddle runs on the reader support of our AF+ Members. If this article meant something to you today — if it informed you or made you smile or feel seen, will you consider joining AF and supporting the people who make this queer media site possible?

Join AF+!