Current mood:	tired
Current music:	Yes I Am album by Melissa Etheridge

32,122 WOW!!
I'm almost there folks and when it is done I will be one tired, proud and relieved woman. I decided to post the rest of the set of entries for the summer on Fire Island at one time.
Okay there is still the warning, although in this case there is only language and adult themes, no sexual situations. Please let me know what you think.






Monday, June 12, 1972

Jeannette arrived last night on the last ferry, we sat up almost all night talking and drinking. Garret had a hangover this morning, so Jeannette and I headed to the beach without him. I could tell I was going to get a patented Jen lecture and more advice than I really wanted.

After we settled on the blanket, she looked at me for a long time. Finally, I spoke up.

‘Okay, get it over with.’ I said waiting for the usual ‘are you all right and have you talked to Garret about what you feel’, questioning.

‘You look good Jack, better than ever, in fact.’ She smiled.

‘Clean living.’ I teased.

‘Yeah right, the youngest pervert in Boston has reformed.’ Jeannette laughed.

‘No fear of that, its just lots of great sex with the man I love.’

‘And are you any closer to getting what you want?’ She asked.

‘It is what it is, Jen. I’ll enjoy it while it lasts and worry about the end when it comes.’ I watched, as three different couples headed to the strip of wood know as The Meat Rack, the spot for anonymous and not so anonymous sex on the Island. Garret had been trying to talk me into having sex in there ever since he found out about it, but the thought of someone seeing us is just too embarrassing. I think the possibility of being seen is part of the attraction the place has for him.

‘Jack, why are you being so cavalier about this, aren’t you worried about what losing Garret is going to do to you?’ Jen looked at me with her concerned surrogate mother expression.

‘Jen, I don’t worry because you do enough worrying for both of us. I just sit back and take it as it comes, because I know you’ll do all the angst and shit.’ I didn’t want her to know how often I cried over him and searched my soul for some hint that I was wrong about how this would end. If she knew just how much it hurt, she’d tell him and he’d be gone.

‘Oh Jack, what am I going to do with you?’ Jeannette shook her head and smiled ruefully. ‘You are determined to go blithely along, never thinking about what you’re going to do when it’s over.’

‘Jen, give it a rest. Its summer, the sun is shining and we’re both young and attractive, lying on a beach with beautiful people all around us. Save the angst trip for a winter afternoon. There’ll be enough of those when he’s gone.’ I lay back on the blanket and pulled my sunglasses down. Suddenly there was a shadow over me; a familiar cultured voice spoke softly.

‘Has our young Lothario decided to explore the more mundane venues of human interaction?’ I opened one eye and smiled.

‘Jen, this is Ambrose Whitley, local purveyor of sexual advice on various topics. Ambrose. This is a friend from the city, Jeannette Rendowski.’

Ambrose leaned over Jeannette’s hand and kissed it. ‘You, my dear, are a ravishing creature and just may persuade me to change my preferences.’

‘And tomorrow the sky will be bright pink with fish flying through the clouds.’ I chuckled.

‘Ignore our youngster, my dear. He has yet to learn that cynicism is the bailiwick of the old and jaded.’ Ambrose unfolded his beach chair and settled himself next to Jeannette’s side of the blanket.

‘It’s only that I worship the quicksand you walk on, Ambrose and want to grow up to be just like you.’ I teased.

‘May all the saints and martyrs preserve you from that death worse than fate my dear boy.’ Ambrose leaned over to Jen and whispered loudly. ‘Now my dear beautiful creature, will you consent to be my muse for this lovely afternoon and allow me to paint you? That is if the lad I engaged to bring my supplies from my bungalow will ever deign to appear.’ As he flirted with Jeanette, a very well built and good-looking guy about my age came up with Ambrose’s easel and supplies.

‘Need anything else, ‘Brose?’ He asked after setting it up.

‘I think that will be all for now, Daniel. If you could come by in about three hours and collect my accoutrements, I shall be quite ready for afternoon tea. Now off with you, no doubt to frolic with some delectably debauched cherub in yon wooded glade.’

‘What?’ The muscle ‘babe’ looked puzzled.

‘Go find a playmate in the Meat Rack, Daniel.’ Ambrose waved the guy away like the Queen Mother dismissing a servant. ‘Such a lovely thing to look upon is our Daniel, but not a brain in that pretty head, I’m afraid. Ah well, betimes beauty and intellect is too great a combined burden to be borne by the son of man. ‘Beauty is worse than wine, it intoxicates both the holder and beholder. A lovely being, scarcely formed or molded, a rose with all its sweetest leaves yet folded’.’

Jeannette mouthed, ‘is this guy for real’ as Ambrose dug around in his box for his paint, I nodded.

‘Now you two darling, lovely children will indulge an artist’s whim and allow me to paint you, will you not?’ I raised an eyebrow at my inclusion and Ambrose continued. ‘Yes you also, my young Adonis, such a delicious picture you two will make, with your sculpted body and our darling young Venus’ hair loosed and blowing around you both, as you cradle her.’ He smiled at his mental image. ‘If only this were Tuscany on a bright summer’s day. What a back drop for such luscious, youthful beauty.’

I looked over at Jeannette questioningly and she nodded. ‘How do you want us to pose, Ambrose?’ The next several moments were passed in Ambrose directing us into the position he wanted to paint and then the three of us spent the next hours talking about anything and everything as Ambrose painted his masterpiece. When Daniel came back, Ambrose promised to let us see the finished work by the end of the week.

After he and his ‘Godfrey’ headed off, Jeannette and I packed up and walked back to the house to shower for dinner.

‘Jack, you attract the most interesting people. Where did you find him?’

‘The town’s only sex shop.’ I grinned as Jeannette stopped dead in the street and squeaked.

‘Sex Shop, my baby boy went to a sex shop? Jack, I’m shocked. Where is it, when can we go and what did you buy. Can I see it and did you and Garret have fun with it?’ She raced through the questions as though try to reach the top of the Pyramid in the bonus round.

‘Yes, I went to a sex shop, it’s just up the main street, tomorrow, fur lined handcuffs, a mask and a feather, yes, you can see them and yes we had a lot of fun.’ I copied Garret’s smirk as I fired the answers back just as rapidly.

‘Smartass.’ She popped me with the towel then ran up the path for the house trying to get away from me. Since I have longer legs I caught her by the pool and tossed her in, splashing Garret who was napping on the lounge. A free for all water fight ensued and we went to dinner, all sounding like swimmers who’d stayed in the pool too long and inhaled too much water into our sinuses.


Friday, June 16, 1972

Jen had a date tonight, yes, there are straight guys on Fire Island and of course, our Jen attracted one the first night we took her to a bar. Five minutes in the place and she had four of them lined up, not to mention seven lesbians each of whom promised her they could change her mind.

His name is Michael Nowakowski and he came over to dinner last night. Garret nearly had Jeannette ready to punch him when he played big brother. He actually ask Michael his intentions, at which point Jeannette told him they were going to the Meat Rack and screw until the cops busted them.

I was doing my best not to laugh when Garret fixed this glare on her and told her she’d better stay away from the Meat Rack. This from the guy who screwed her the first night we met her while I was sleeping in the same bed. At that point, I lost it and was rolling on the sofa with laughter, tears streaming down my face. Michael and Jeannette clutched each other and gasped for breath between gales of laughter, while Garret glowered at the three of us, until Jen and I tackled him down to the couch and tickled him into submission.



Friday, July 21, 1972

This has got to be the worst day of my life. Garret has blown a fuse and Jeannette is pissed at both of us, so no one in the house is talking to anyone.

I think I know why Jeannette is so pissed, I mean having a fight with your lover in front of a restaurant is not designed to make other people comfortable, but I didn’t think one word would start a blow up.

Okay this is what happened. We were sitting at breakfast, well I guess since it was 11AM you would have to call it brunch, but anyway, we were sitting at a table and Ambrose came over so I introduced him to Garret. He was standing up with a smile on his face and reaching out his hand to Ambrose when I forgot myself and referred to him as my boyfriend. Suddenly there was a hole in the world, we were hissing at each other in that ‘I refuse to yell in public’ voice, and he stormed out.

I followed and caught up to him outside the restaurant, we proceeded to round on each other like Bette Davis and Joan Crawford over who should win the Oscar and people were staring. All that was lacking was to have the two of us dressed in the housedresses and curlers of the low class fishwives we sounded like. Jeannette came out and pulled us apart, sent me off with Ambrose and marched Garret back to the house.

Ambrose fixed me a cup of tea, which I soon discovered had an almost lethal amount of whiskey in it, and made me tell him the whole story. When I was finished with all of it, from the first date until now and I do mean every bit including my realization that Garret will leave me, he looked me up and down and dropped the ‘English Gentry crossed with southern aristocrat’ attitude and I got to hear the real Ambrose.

‘Love, Jack is a many ‘splintered’ thing. It can pierce our hearts with pain in so many ways it defies counting. The only thing you can do is to breathe through the pain until it ends and pray the love doesn’t go with it. The only wrong way to love is too little. I don’t think you are in danger of that, my boy.’ He poured more whiskey in my cup and sat back. ‘The truest knowledge of loving is in realizing it might be lost and you’ve already come to that knowledge, you know that Garret is going to leave you someday if he cannot change his way of looking at the world. As for Jeannette’s concerns for you I can only say, the heart has its reasons which the mind cannot comprehend.’

Ambrose sighed and took my hand. ‘You are seeing time as your enemy but you forget one simple thing. Henry Van Dyke said it best ‘Time is too slow for those who wait, too swift for those who fear, too long for those who grieve, too short for those who rejoice, but for those who love, time is eternity’. Let go of the fear and enjoy your eternity with Garret. No matter how long or short it is and remember, that he is afraid and if you can help him let go of his fear, you will have a long and wonderful life together. It’s plain to see that Garret loves you, but he is so blinded by what society has told him is right and wrong that he can’t express that love freely.’

‘Brose, how can I do that, I don’t know how to get past my own fear of losing him.’ He put his arm around me.

‘Jack, you are so very like me it hurts. I wish I had some sage advice on how to proceed but I don’t. I know what you have to do but not how you should do it. You see, I failed with the love of my life and lost him to convention. That, sweet boy, is why I am reduced to the paid company of attractive imbeciles like the lovely Daniel, while the one I love sits in the front pew of the First Baptist Church of Savannah each Sunday next to his wife of thirty-five years and basks in the glow of his three children and six grandchildren.’ Ambrose stood and pulled me up.

‘Off you go now, I’ve no doubt our darling Jeannette has calmed Garret enough that the neighborhood won’t resound with a repeat of the war we witnessed at brunch and you’ve some fence mending to do, my boy.’

‘Why should I apologize, when he’s the one who started it?’

Ambrose cuffed me in the head gently. ‘Because you, prideful termagant, some one must make the first move. You and I both know that the lion’s share of this morning’s contretemps lies squarely on his shoulders, but if you don’t want to lose what time you might have left, you will do as I say. Now try not to show your youthful ignorance and go humble yourself to save your love, pup.’

When I got back to the house, Garret was out by the pool and wouldn’t even look at me and Jen was staring daggers at me when I went through the living room. I don’t care what Ambrose says; I am not apologizing until he does. I just wanted to introduce the man I love to a friend, it’s not like Ambrose is going to tell the world that Garret swings both ways.

Jesus, if he can walk around Fire Island holding my hand and dance with me in the club with both hands grabbing my ass, why can’t I introduce him as my boyfriend. It’s not like Madame has spies creeping around Cherry Grove and hiding in the Meat Rack to spot us.

I just wanted to enjoy telling someone that this amazing, handsome, sexy man was with me. That he chose to be with the weird little smart kid that nobody liked. To shout out to the world that some one wonderful and funny and gentle loved me.

I just wanted to share what I feel for him with a friend and he couldn’t let go of his hang-ups enough for that. I lay down across the bed and thought about what Ambrose had said about moving past the fear. I’m not sure how to do that. Sometimes the fear of the day he leaves crawls into my throat and chokes me.

I guess the first thing I can do is go apologize.




Saturday, July 22, 1972

How can you be so angry with someone and yet still want to have sex with them?

I want him so much it hurts and yet I am still mad enough to kill him. I went to apologize to him and he just looked at me like I was some alien that was spouting ‘Take me to your leader’. The more I talked the more he stared and then he grabbed my hand and dragged me to the bedroom.

After he stripped me, he just stood there looking at me for the longest time. Suddenly he was all over me, pulling me down to the bed and kissing me hard. He never said a word the whole time and afterward he just walked out and didn’t come back until 3 AM. I knew he had been out screwing some girl he picked up, because he reeked of cheap perfume and sex when he came in. I guess he needed to prove to himself that he’s straight after banging the faggot.

Right now, he’s dead asleep and I would like nothing more at the moment but to walk over to the bed put a pillow over his face and hold it there until he stops moving, then pull a Frederic March and walk into the sea never to return.

On the other hand, I want to wake him up and fuck him until he can’t walk. Brand myself so deep into his skin that he’ll never be able to deny me again and then make love to him so long and so gently that neither one of us can remember a time when we weren’t making love.

I love him, I hate him, I want to kill him and I want to make love to him. I want him gone and I never want him to leave. I am so confused.


Sunday, July 23, 1972

Just when I’m ready to kill him, he goes and pulls something like this. When he woke up, he told me everything like a little boy seeking forgiveness and then took me back to the restaurant where we fought. He pulled me inside, proceeded to tell the entire restaurant that he is a complete idiot who doesn’t deserve a boyfriend like me and then he kissed me in the middle of Sunday lunch rush right in the center of the dining room.

I think he could get me to forgive him for causing world war three. I love him so much but now I understand why people kill those they love. It’s because no one else can make you crazier than someone you love can.



Wednesday, August 30, 1972

Jeannette went home yesterday and we leave tomorrow. It’s our last day on the Island and I don’t want to go back to Boston. I want to live here forever, forget school and my parents. Garret can play drums in the club band, I’ll tend bar, and we’ll fight and make love and buy this wonderful magical house and live here forever.

It’s a beautiful fantasy and in the movies, it would all come true, but this is real life and we have to catch the early ferry, so we can make our train to Boston. So today is all about packing and saying goodbye. I guess that after I get my things stuffed into my bag, I’ll go see Ambrose and find out if he has any more words of wisdom.

This has been a beautiful, horrible, exhilarating and confusing summer and I would do it again in a minute. Well, except for the fight, although the make up sex that Sunday afternoon was absolutely, amazingly indescribable. I wish the summer would never end, but it has and it’s time for reality. Garret says we’ll come back next summer and rent the same house.

Why do I feel like we’ll never be back here again?


Thursday, August 31, 1972

Ambrose gave me the painting as a gift and it is so beautiful. I am sitting with my back to the viewer but turned enough that you can see my profile and Jeannette is facing me with her legs curled under her and leaning against me. The only thing covering us is her long red hair being caught by the wind.

He also gave me a second painting of me, which I never sat for. It’s Garret and I in almost the same pose and we’re looking at each other. You can feel the love in our eyes like a force of nature; Ambrose said he rarely painted anything he did not see and that he wanted me to have a tangible piece of hope for any dark days that might come.

He called the painting of the two of us ‘Love Conquers’. I haven’t shown it to Garret yet, I don’t know how he would take it. He won’t even carry a picture of me for fear what people will think, except for a snapshot of he, Jeannette and I on the Commons the summer she lived with us.

I don’t care what he says about it though I am keeping it, to remind me that miracles can happen, even at age fifty-five the way they happened for ‘Brose. He met a man named Thomas Windham from Connecticut the first week of August and they fell in love.

Thomas is forty and openly gay, he is the town veterinarian and he wants ‘Brose to move to Connecticut. His small town has no problem with Thomas’ orientation and indeed, when his lover of ten years died two years ago the whole town came to the funeral and took care of Thomas until he was back on his feet. ‘Brose is seriously thinking about it.