Because I grew up in DC, went to college in Williamsburg (VA), grad school in Baltimore, and then spent my 20’s in Philadelphia, the farther south I go the more (and younger) personal history I run into.
I spent less than two years in Baltimore, but they were so transformative that I came out a different (and much more, although I was 50 pounds lighter) person than I was when I arrived. The most basic thing, I guess, is that I turned 21 a month after I moved there, so now an adult. I was living on my own for the first time. Living in a city for the first time – something I enjoyed so much that I’ve lived in cities ever since. Hitting the reality that, actually, despite my single-minded focus during my undergrad years, it looked like I now didn’t actually want to be a professional hornist – although I’d now discovered other musical talents that were very much worth pursuing.
And, most importantly – so much so that it basically overshadows my weird but wonderful grad school experience – I came out of the closet. I put my big-boy pants on (and then took them off, heh-heh-heh) and stopped trying to force myself into any other lane but ‘gay’, and started down the path of, ‘if this is the case, then what do I do about it?’. So that meant getting gay books out of the library, and finally getting up the nerve to go to a gay bar, and then to actually talk to someone and then to go home with them and finally erode my virginity to the point it was gone. (There is much detail here, which will, I’m planning, go into a book someday, but I’ll leave it alone for now.) Reading more gay literature, attending pride events (I attended a talk with Quentin Crisp!). And realizing what awful people men can be, and getting my heart broken, but also falling in love – and just trying things, treating it all as an experiment I didn’t necessarily have to get right.
Certainly, the first result of the experiment, was “oh, yes, I’m definitely gay and this is the right path to be on”, and then it was about not only figuring out how it worked, but coming out to my family, and then friends and then just being out. So by the time I left Baltimore, I was an out, proud, reasonably confident and certainly no longer virginal gay man, and a strong one too, an identity which has served me well and served as a base for me since.
Which is why, when I go back to Baltimore, I make sure I have a drink at The Drinkery, the first bar I ever went to (shaking with nervousness like an aspic in a high wind). It’s very much an African-American bar now, but I didn’t feel like I was unwelcome… or that I should hang around either. But then I go to Leon’s, right down the block, where I probably spent most of my time once I got my bearings back in the day. (Most young men hung out at the Hippo, I think, now sadly closed, and more disco-y and fun, but I found Leon’s to be just my speed.) It’s an older crowd, as basic as a bar can get, but very social. There’s two bar spaces, actually, but it’s the ‘backroom’ (not really a backroom as in a place to have anonymous sex) that’s the popular spot. I went three times during my visit a few weeks ago, and just felt like I was coming home, so comfortable there.
Since I’m trying to figure out what my social life is going to look like now, after almost 3 decades off the market, I do think finding a convivial congenial bar is a nice thing to do – and I’ve found several in NYC. But I also don’t want to spend time at a place where, really, the only activity if you’re not talking to someone, is drinking. So, yeah, go to bars sparingly unless there’s an event – a drag show, karaoke, two-stepping or whatever. (Boy, I miss two-stepping, will have to start going to the Big Apple Range again.)
So… I guess bottom line is it’s nice to reconnect with my history, and if/when I start writing this book, I’ll have to spend more time in Baltimore visiting old haunts and reliving old impressions (more on this in a bit) and going to the library to look up old Baltimore Gay Paper issues and other alternative weeklies. It would be nice to find proof of the ad for the support group for young gay men coming out that I joined, or personal ads I answered.
Other things about the trip – I had a great time at the G&S thing and spent some great quality time with my friends Bob and Sheri, who I’d met last time I was at one of these things.
I spent Sunday just walking – I wanted to walk down N. Charles from Peabody and go to the Inner Harbor. I discovered that, while I was 99% sure of the block where my old law firm was, I couldn’t remember the exact building. (I worked there part-time my second year, very helpful financially.) Then down to the harbor.
Do you all have that thing in dreams where you have a really well-defined dreamscape, like a college campus or a city or such, and you sometimes return to it, even though it’s not a real place? Well, I do, and sometimes, when I visit old haunts (like a real college campus I haven’t been to in decades), I’ll recognize a path or a building or whatever and realize that it was the source of part of the dreamscape. ‘Oh, that’s where that came from.” So it’s surroundings that you don’t necessarily think about, but which get lodged in your brain and come out in a weird way.
Anyway, there’s a tall office building sort of catty-corner from the malls at the Inner Harbor, and you pass under it on a plaza, and when I got there, I totally gasped and went, “I recognize you.” Again, a piece of a very weird dreamscape that’s come up – and now, which I realize, is probably modelled on the Inner Harbor area itself. So.. that explains that.
I can’t remember the last time I was down there, easily could be 35 years ago. Kind of mostly the same, but there’s a visitors center and a science museum now and the park below Fort McHenry has been built up somewhat. So I did that half-loop up there, then came back and passed the aquarium. (the two malls seem to be dead now – just restaurants, really). I did stop in a drugstore – it was far sunnier and cloudless than I was expecting, and I bought sunscreen – and then kept going. I walked all the way down to Fells Point. This wasn’t really a walk you can do in the 80’s, kind of nasty between the harbor and there, but now it’s all built up and fancy. (Eric stops in a Whole Foods to use their bathroom.) Made it all the way to FB, walked around the shops (very nice) and had lunch at Bertha’s Mussel’s (have been seeing Bertha’s Mussel’s t-shirts my whole life – oh, it’s a real restaurant!).
I’d walked almost 5 miles by this point, decided not to retrace my steps – thought about taking the water taxi back to the harbor, but then got the idea to Uber up to the Art Museum, which I’d never been to. I loved it, it’s free and the art was great! I guess I’d driven by it a hundred times, it’s just south of the Johns Hopkins campus. Started to walk back and immediately south of the art museum, hit on a park that I’d remembered as the site of Baltimore Pride celebrations we’d attended when the Philly Band came down to march in the parade. (Memories of that, too – running into old boyfriends at these events, more than one of whom passed away not long after – and no, I had nothing to do with that. It’ll all be in the book.)
A mile and a half back to Mt. Vernon, walking through sketchy (or merely sad) neighborhoods – lots of poverty in Baltimore. Walked by the old site of the Gallery bar, a place I went to less frequently because it was farther away. And ended up back at my hotel eventually. Great walk.
I wanted to get cleaned up and spend some quality time in a local coffee bar blogging and drinking mocha, but the coffee bar was closed. (on a Sunday afternoon! WTF?) Ended up having a not-that-great drink in the hotel bar, and went out later to Sammy’s Trattoria for Italian food for dinner.
One thing I will have to remember when traveling is a hotel room can be fine for sleeping and ablutions, but be cramped and uncomfortable if you want to, for instance, just sit and watch TV and knit. My room was one of those, and I’ll have to think about that next time I book a hotel room anywhere.
Postscript – I got up the next morning and had breakfast and then took the train back to NYC, ‘working’ on the train as much as possible. Then when I got off the train, found out that someone had taken my big black suitcase – leaving their nearly identical big black suitcase behind. I panicked a bit, especially since whoever did that could have gotten off in Philly or an earlier stop, but their contact info was on their suitcase, and mine was on mine, so I dropped off their suitcase at the Amtrak luggage office. And later in the day, they contacted me and it turned out they were in NYC, in Times Square not far from the train station, and we got it all sorted out. If I’d known it would resolve as it did, I would have just gone to my office after getting off the train, and their hotel would have literally been a block away, but I’d gone home to Queens, so had to come back in. Worth it, though, as my CPAP machine was in there.
Anyway, the end. Don’t hold your breath for the book, but I really do want to write it.
And more blog posts in the hopper: my Ruddigore concert, the anniversary of Charles’s passing, my trip to visit my family (happening now) and so on.
The Toast Point Page 