Fire Island is a magical place. This was my second time there and it was very different from my first time. First of all, 2 dear friends of mine whom I love were unable to attend for personal reasons. I completely understand, but they're the boys whom I love the most, so their presence was sorely missed.
First some geography, Google Map Fire Island. As you can see, it's a tiny sliver of a barrier island in front of Long Island. (Wikipedia.org Fire Island if you want a rather bland overview). What's funny is how long it takes New Yorkers to get to the beach. The usual rountine is you have to take a taxi to Penn Station, then Penn Station to the Long Island Railroad. The LIRR drops you off at the ferry, and you take a 20 minute ferry to Fire Island (since there is no land bridge connected to it). On a good day it takes over 2 hours and an average cost of $40 or so. That's right, at least 3 forms of transportation to get to the beach. To get to the beachg in Miami, I simply woke up, went the elevator and hit "L" for Lobby and walked 4 blocks. Total cost $0, Total time - 10 minutes. New Yorkers do get motivated to get some beach time.
Fire Island really does give me a good idea what it would be like if gays ruled the world. All the homes would be fabulous, environmentally friendly, architecturally distinct, filled with expensive, delicious food, tons of alcohol, and a really open, sharing, caring place. A nice gentlemen offered to help carry my bags back to the harbor to get on the ferry. Some of the guys driving the little trolleys asked an elderly gentleman if he needed a ride to his house. Strangers being nice to one another. What a concept! There are no cars allowed on the island. Also, what's fascinating to me is that everything that is there on Fire Island was shipped there via a boat. Every board, every nail, all the food, everything has to loaded, shipped and unloaded.
But it's not just the houses, it's the whole routine. Most people get up late after partying all night, lay by their pool or go to the beach or visit their friends, then comes low tea, high tea, then a late dinner followed by a night out at the best named gay bar in the whole world - Sip & Twirl. (I've been to over a 200 gay bars around the world, believe me - Sip & Twirl is the most innovatively named).
Last year in the city I met a really nice guy, let's call him Wes - since that's his name. We had a nice time in the city and then a nice time together out on FI for 2 days. We continued our little "affair" for a month and then he came to visit me in Miami. That weekend was a complete disaster in a cartoonish, almost inappropriately bad sitcom. Funny stories, but a train wreck and I couldn't get him to the airport quickly enough. I got stung.
Well, this year, I got shot with an arrow. I met a guy I really like. And I mean, we got along so well it was scary (good scary, not Saw 4 torture scary). We met on Wednesday night. I went out with some friends to Sip & Twirl. I spied this really cute guy playing pool with 3 other friends. They all seemed pretty close and I assumed one of them was his boyfriend, but I figured I'd flirt and see what happened. So here's my move (I was getting some signals and established he didn't have a boyfriend), we start talking and I go in for a smootch. He backs away (never a good sign), and says that if I beat him at pool, I get a kiss. Done. I was drunk, but I did beat him at pool. He was pretty good, but I was better. (I have to say though, how many gay stories start with, "Well...after beating him at pool..."). We spent as much time as we could together for the rest of the weekend. I still had my stuff to do and dinners to attend with my posse, as did he, but we went to the beach, and spent every night together. It was a really nice experience.
It just feels like I'm ready for a relationship. I wanted at least a year to be single after my last relationship ended, and then the possible LA move thing would come up occassionally for the next year. I didn't want to be in a relationship and wonder about transplanting it 3000 miles away in Los Angeles, so I held off on anything that would get serious. But knowing that I was leaving Miami and moving to LA, my perspective changed.
All in all, a great second trip to Fire Island.
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