I hadn’t gone to the beach in forever.
Honestly, I think Baker in particular, I hadn’t been to since November of 2023. It’s a long haul, perhaps foolishly I’m still waiting out the perfect Corvair instead of choosing the boredom of another ordinary modern car. I only want to drive these days for special occasions anyways. Jostling with Waymos and self driving to self immolating Teslas takes the joy out of ordinary errands as is.
I haven’t spent as much time in nature as I should. Transit doesn’t really take you to nature without having to devote a whole day, especially in the Bay Area. The nature that is offered to you right off a BART or a Bus line is teeming with human life. I was sad to find out that the first warm breath of Spring, even on a Monday, would make Baker Beach this too.
I mean, I thought the whole world had gone back to its regularly scheduled programming. I thought that I’d have the seclusion of the sand and sea relatively to myself, with the sprinkling of other nude sunbathers far far away. I thought, maybe witchily, that because I put the time away months ago, that I had done myself a restorative solid.
Then there was the gaggle of white girls on the 38 blaring what I guess was Taylor Swift to my curmudgeonly ears through the tinniness of Bluetooth speakers. As we passed Masonic I finally pulled my eyes up, in horror, to see that they were clad in what teenage white girls have been wearing for seemingly two decades now when there’s some hint of summer heat possible. I found myself immediately dreading my choices, not splurging on a Zipcar for the day to get further away from another thing I can’t stand about still being here.
I can’t stand the pure banality, the utmost adherence to heterosexuality, the perfunctory nature of it all, the prescription, the bad medicine of this putrid society and the saccharine sweet & low that permeates whiteness and those that crave adjacency generation after generation.
I had to switch buses at 25th. I was relieved when the boisterous youth thought it would be a great idea to get Boba instead of waiting 11 minutes for the 29.
I hadn’t made the effort to go this far in San Francisco for reasons, many reasons over the span of 4 seasons. Upstairs in an apartment on my route to what once was a sanctuary is something I’ve never been allowed to see, probably because I could detect the truth of the horrors that lay within from miles away. The invites were given, then retracted, sometimes justified as protection in my direction, sometimes a lack of faith in my fearlessness.
Perhaps a fear of what my tongue would taste in the heaviness of those 5 rooms, decades of deceits and lies, the rancid open wounds no one dares discuss. They might not be visible, but I see them. I was told such truth telling wouldn’t bring them in, but I said what I said anyways. I’d rather open the wound then at bare minimum splash a little witch hazel on them to clean the flesh, hope there’s an opportunity for the festering to stop. I’m sad at what I said, sometimes you gotta recognize that the difference between one block from heaven and one block from hell is a line of love and hate.
Spring in the Bay Area, even when it’s warm, has a chill of winter to it underneath that you feel in your bones oddly more intensely than winter itself. Spring is a liar here, there’s not exactly the same promise of new life as there is elsewhere. I wasn’t overly warm despite the fact that I choose lime green seersucker pants to give myself a Sprite like appearance with the canary yellow button up. I questioned whether it was really warm enough to let the sun fully bake me, cautionary was the inclusion of mint green swimming trunks and a cardigan in case.
I had planned this, like I said recently, anything that I do that looks spontaneous actually has been planned for 5 times as long. I had risen despite the staycation at 5am, doing that quick Duck Confit Recipe, taking a long bath, making potato salad, picking up Blood Oranges at the Farmers Market that past Friday. Two cans of sparkling water, the gifted picnic basket, the roll of Ultramax these photos were shot on lingering as a leftover from Philly and Baltimore this past Winter. The timing of the trip so I’d know I wouldn’t be *directly* miserably under the noon sun, that any photos I’d take would have the *proper* amount of shadow to highlight details.
Detail oriented I might be, but I still forgot sunblock.
The level of solitary meticulousness wasn’t matched by anyone I saw on the beach. No Picnic Baskets, hell the young gayasian couple in front of me literally went to Mixt for Salads for the beach. No color coordinated outfits, no rituals, an amazing amount of still scrolling on their phones, Tik Tok vids threatening to drown out the crash of the waves on the shore. Do I even belong here anymore?
I’m trying my best to still practice my rituals as I note one foot has been out the door where I was born seemingly forever, but at least since 2012. I’ve forestalled for 13 or more years pining for something new while I linger in the increasingly technofascist update of Zardoz that has become San Francisco these days. Sure, the opportunities, as far as I know, to feel a seabreeze tickle the hairs on my ass are gonna be far fewer on the historically more puritan East Coast, hell, seems I’ll need to cross state lines from where I intend to land to find a nude beach.
And still, there’s not enough to ground me here in what I already know. I don’t think the love I still feel for the land that birthed me is lost, nor for the souls new to the place and long lingering on the land either. I honestly wish they’d all honestly engage with me to see what was worth fighting for, what is worth giving up, or at least consider taking the ride with me to figure it out. This isn’t the time to be lulled by the stasis we once knew.
I mistakenly typed comfort first. I had to double back to the sensation of no matter how I forced myself to be present in the reality of a setting I thought I would always cherish. The purity of laying with the minimum of layers between me and existence, in full display, historically thoroughly enjoying the thin line of innocence of nudity and sometimes the vulgarity of arousal of witnessing others in the same state. I tried hard, I laid for 4 hours, perhaps enough to fade the tan lines I’ve gotten since the last time I indulged myself. But it was too loud, too chaotic, not as restful, not as private and, dare I say it, queer as it used to be.
I’ve put 25 years of my life on the line, growing under this type of sun into a form of queerness that cherishes the act of toasting, almost in a birthright way, in a way of giving yourself back to some sort of divine stillness and warmth I guess I think we should all feel. I worry that there’s more limitations coming for me to preserve this level of warmth. I worry that as the world blows cold right now, I’m gonna be a forgotten anomaly. I sincerely hope not. I sincerely want to invite some more of that rebellious warmth and stillness in my life.
I gave up, re-robed myself in my Spring get up, packed it in as I packed it out, to be stopped by the rattle of the aluminum cans by some straight woman, flanked by two younger men that, I mean, I’ve given up trying to figure out what anyone’s perceived sexuality is. She sat, faux white woman goddess-like, fully nude, overly waxed snatch and all for all intents and purposes looking like a krispy kreme donut colored computer mouse. I think perceived sexuality goes both ways, especially when racialized. I know when I’m being sized up for a conquest. I definitely didn’t even give a chance to be sacrificed for these heathens.
She barked at me
“…got any booze in those cans for me?”
“No” I replied, flatly, not really wanting to engage.
“Got any weed for me?”
“All I had was sparking water, Duck Confit and Potato Salad, and I ate it all.”
I said with an almost hysterical bend into that inflection of my voice that says I’m more Larry David than Jones after all. I even, picnic basket and all, did the melodramatic shrug before walking off. I only matter to this land as a commodity, what I can give. I want reciprocity that is not even a fictionalized possibility here anymore. Again, I wonder, who can I take along as the ruins of what once lay in tatters. I still love what was here. I still love who is here. I hate the now. Venus said it’s a love/hate relationship.
“I love your outfit” wafted on the breeze out to the pacific as I walked back to the 29. Humming to myself, but humming to who I miss the most.
“We gotta get out of this place, if it’s the last thing we ever do. We gotta get out of this place, boy, there’s a better life for me and you.”
