MarQ1

Sometimes I feel like my life is insufficiently gay. And I don’t mean happy. I’m unfizzy. Flat. Anti-fabulous.

This usually happens after we come back from PTown. Yes, PTown is a bit of a gay fantasyland, but so is Manhattan. I feel so dull, almost corporate.

I’m OUT at work. It’s not a feeling of closetedness; it’s a sense of not living up to my gay potential. I’m boring gay-wise. My job is boring gay-wise. It’s not a gay job.

I don’t know anyone gay at work. I know that some people are gay, but I don’t know them.

Without giving up my job, which does in a limited way allow a bit of diva-ism, I want to be more gay.

I hereby vow to be gayer, as soon I figure out what I mean by that.

More on the vacation after the break. If the gay stuff makes you uncomfortable, move on. Not that I’m getting explicit, but I prefer my rudeness to be intentional.

The Break

The fall weekend we go to PTown is Mates Weekend, a leather and fetish weekend with parties and a Leatherman contest, but since this is PTown it’s pretty casual. This isn’t IML. It’s more my taste than Bear Week, frankly, but there is some overlap. As we all get older, a bit more overlap than I would like, if you know what I mean. My chaps are a bit tighter in the thighs than they used to be, but that might be due to cycling. I hope.

We always go up a day early to relax before the crowd arrives and leave a day later to have a day almost to ourselves. These are good knitting, shopping and reading days. I kit a ton. I ready two and a half books. I found a good, simple biker jacket for 40% off, a pea jacket, some jeans and a flattering black t-shirt.

See, that sounds gay. Why can’t I do that here? [Because, generally, I hate shopping with other shoppers in NYC, particularly the tourists.]

Unlike the summer vacation, I actually got J out to the bars every night, save Monday, when I just wanted to sleep. I like watching other people in bars. And we would hit Spiritus afterwards, but not for long, because it was a tad too cool. Still just watching the guys.

Saturday night, we went to the Mates contest at Paramount at the Crown and Anchor. Let’s start by saying that this is one of the lamest venues. Cr@ppy, overpriced beer. A inconsistent DJ. The mike didn’t work worth beans. That fake smoke. Practically no sightlines. But forget all that. There I encountered the Cretin.

We found a spot on a riser to elevate ourselves high enough to see something of the show. The guy in front of us decided he didn’t like us there and kept bumping me in the stomach. I suppose he wanted to friends to stand where we were. I’m stubborn. I’m not moving. I asked him to stop bumping my stomach. He just laughed and told me to move. Hah! He joked with his friends that he was 6′5″ and 285 and what was I going to do about it. I glared and stood my ground. So the Cretin’s trying to pick a fight in a gay bar/club with a guy ten to fifteen years older, more than a foot shorter and less than half his weight? Why? To prove he’s not some sissy? His boyfriend kept eyeing me too. I couldn’t decide whether he was checking me out (shirtless, leather suspenders) or checking for weapons. We thought he was bit creepy, especially in his choice of boyfriends, but at least cuter than the thug (think Frankenstein’s monster).

To top it off, the Cretin and his friends were audibly (in a loud bar) making fun of the contestants and the people in the bar/club. I assume he’s the local bully at his neighborhood piano bar.

That was probably the worst part of the weekend. Jerks are everywhere.

The weather was almost perfect. Sleeveless or shirtless weather Friday and Saturday afternoon. Friday morning and Sunday were wet, but fine for knitting or reading or napping.

The best party was the Sunday night closing party at Purgatory. Definitely worth staying for. The DJ was better. A smaller, friendlier, more intimate crowd. A few cute boys under 30, which always helps. Some cute ones over thirty too. One or two cuties over fifty. Lots of flesh. Some new leather, some old. Some incredibly stressed latex wear. And a slightly better class of beer.

What made it really nice was the knowledge we had to be nowhere the next day.

The Spiritus parade afterward was cut short when at 10 after one it started raining.

Monday night we had dinner at the Mews, which again was wonderful. If you go, get a table on the second floor in the front section. The waiter, tall with a shaved head, whose name I forget, is cheerful, funny and the perfect waiter: there when you want him, not there when you don’t.

Addendum

Btw, I’ve updated the “69 Things.”

This entry was posted on Monday, October 9th, 2006 at 3:51 pm and is filed under gay, vacation. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. Both comments and pings are currently closed.