I had put off a few more days than ideal after I got restructured out of a job to do ‘self care.’ I knew to a degree I had to do something that was celebratory that wasn’t getting inebriated. I didn’t exactly know why I felt a pull towards Lake Tahoe. I had honestly thought as an alternative that I should maybe visit the Trinity Alps north of Weaverville. Maybe I should take California Route 3 as a backroads route to Mt. Shasta? I started to reason with myself. It is further away by 2 more hours than Tahoe.
It is also ‘The state of Jefferson.’
I’ve never had an easy time with Redding or Red Bluff. I got plenty of ‘what is this nigger doing here?’ stares even the In & Out directly off the 5 when I was doing that hustle drive back to the Bay Area from Portland in 2019. I regretted that I needed a bathroom break alongside a celebratory double double animal style with animal style fries. I get the feeling I wouldn’t be typing here had I decided to go to the most northern direct remnant of the confederacy a week or so ago. I got reminded how that felt when I drove 50 miles outside of Philadelphia.
Joey took me to have Scrapple in the wildest introduction to what it looks like to ‘make ‘murica great again.’ Tony the Tiger was nowhere to be found on the menu. There was a nice looking 1990 Delta 88 in the parking lot of the joint tho. I more readily understood all of the walls, all of the overwhelm of the fantasy of being rural farming queers crashing down around him and Dan. They reassured me they only flew the American Flag in the driveway as a safety measure. When I think of this, I think I’m ready to write the most nuanced update of The Green Book.
Granted, I have more adult legacy with ‘Upstate California.’ My second long distance solo road trip was after Christmas 2012 to Eureka. I was quizzed by the hotel clerk regarding why in the hell did I choose Eureka in the ass end of December. He really digged into the “why Eureka?” more than why the time of the year. He did a deep imply about my physical being being not very demographically aligned with Humboldt County. I just wanted to ignore that the shocks on my 260E were creaking from my exuberant cornering coming up the Redwood Highway.
“It has the most victorians per capita in the United States!” I excitedly said.
I should fact check that for accuracy.
He shrugged and gave me keys. He muttered something about the dreary weather. It was no different, and oddly a little less intense than the rain I had just left in the Bay Area. It was the first time I felt fully ‘grown.’ Sure I had driven solo to Morro Bay then Pasadena for my 30th birthday six months prior. Getting lost in the woods of the lost coast felt more significant. It felt more dangerous and subversive. It felt more like me to get away as far as possible from the concepts of what everyone else considered travel, leisure and even pleasure.
When I got settled in my hotel room, I turned on the news to hear Fontella Bass had died. Old Shindig clips of her singing “Rescue Me” surprised me. The, if I remember correctly, ABC affiliate station based in downtown Eureka was doing a decent job with coverage. It was a pretty extensive overview for what most people remember inaccurately as a soul singer oft derided as a one hit wonder and Aretha Franklin at the same time. I chalked it up to the slow news cycle that used to happen between Christmas and New Years and not any true reverence for a formidable force in mid century R&B. Her passing at 72 seemed a little too young that I associate with a wildfire vocal style that predated The Queen of Soul remembering she was an Aries and that she should leave some of the Sam Cooke style jazz-pop crooning behind.
I hadn’t learned yet the price you pay for being an example. Not that I hadn’t been paying a price for decades but I liked remaining oblivious to that reality. More likely I had buried what that felt like. A lot of the time you are an example not by your choice. Sometimes being made an example of will shock you into an out-of-body experience. For me, it took decades and location to figure out exactly why I don’t readily offer up my experiences as a sample size.
Lake Tahoe is 1,645 feet deep at its deepest point. That’s the second deepest lake in the U.S. after Crater Lake. There’s a metaphor and a joke in there about wherever Jimmy Hoffa’s body was dumped and how I anchor some memories with cement blocks at their feet. I do my best to forget. I really hope those memories never resurface.
They have with an astonishing rate and vivacity as of late. It’s the cleaner slates of living alone for 2 years combined with the rapid expansion of time not committed to 9 to 5 labor in the last 3 weeks. There’s that pull that I put myself in the place where a few sets of memory were created. I’m finding I’m I doing this more subconsciously than not quite often. I shouldn’t be surprised by the increased frequency given what I’ve set in front of me.
I didn’t really have to stay a week in Baltimore before I was in Philadelphia doing the full contemplation of my upcoming move. It honestly would have been beneficial to just be in Philly a full additional week instead of rushing about frantically trying to learn the city street grid. There was so much to look forward to. There’s so much to be excited about, even if “The Rib Crib” has been out of business for years.
I cried and I cried, and then cried some more a set of heavy tears that amplified the already humid August Tuesday afternoon I sat alone in Wyman Park. I grieved a certain reality that could have been had I’d been braver at the end of 2017. Portland was never the choice I really wanted to make. The little romance that it did spark blew up in my face before I even landed in the city limits. It felt like I was asking for absolution from Baltimore. I had cheated with somewhere, and someone, inferior.
I was not confident that I’d find work. I was afraid of keeping my head above water. I wasn’t too sure that looks in my direction were more than just glances. I’m not too sure I was good at returning the intensity of those looks to make up for the lack of words exchanged. That’s no different than now. I think some parties have grieved as much as me.
It would explain, once again, why I’ve experienced it more as a weapon rather than sorrow. I saw a break that I was in denial about. I already knew what the ‘fuck up’ really was. I understand now. There’s two parties involved where belief has the other party carrying sole blame. We finally shared a weeknight out together that was perfect. If you can find your joy with someone after the bullshit of a typical Tuesday, that might be the love of your life.
I cried because of the glimpses I still was receiving of what could have been. The alternate universe crossed over into reality as if I had made the choice to be in ‘Charm City.’ It stung like a bee. To my knowledge, I haven’t been stung by a bee yet, but I think I’ve accidentally eaten one. In reality, the way the pain lingered for months after August, I thought I’d lost a limb. When I board the Southwest flight in a few weeks to solidify if this is my future, this will be the first time that I will bypass Baltimore.
It seems that I needed to remind myself why I was an outsider. There were some core lessons from Tahoe I needed to understand. I could have leaned a bit harder into some positive memories that I haven’t claimed from this part of the world. Had I kept pressing on I-80, I would have just made hay out of staying in Reno. The closeted uncle that bought me my first car lived most of his retired life there. I’ve always wondered if there was a mystery boyfriend or partner I never got to meet. There’s so many questions because of respect, distance and denial that I didn’t get to ask. If there was love in these here hills, I sure as hell wasn’t told about it.
Tahoe started to remind me what he saw in me at certain extended family gatherings planned for the south shore of the Lake. I knew I told on myself that I didn’t explicitly stay in South Lake. I choose Camp Richardson, a good 10 miles west, closer to Emerald Bay. I had flirted with staying on the north shore. It seems more ritzy, more affluent. The plethora of CyberTrucks around the rim of the lake shocked yet didn’t surprise me. I had made piece long ago whenever I see hotel rooms at minimum over $100 a night, I was going to find perhaps the worst culture of modern California.
It had been a warm drive up the mountain. I rolled into Camp Richardson with the windows down. The desk clerk stood on the porch with the landscaper. I audibly overheard burbling conversations about who was pulling up in the classic car. I was also pulling up on a Monday to a basically deserted resort. Most of the surrounding parks still had their parking lots closed for Winter. It was about 62 degrees outside as I pulled the parking brake handle and switched the ignition off.
“Corvair man?” the clerk said
“1967?” said the landscaper
“Yes, Nineteen sixty FIVE” I said pivoting from one face to the other.
When I entered the hotel room, I was surprised that there was no mini-fridge or television. I hadn’t really bothered looking at the listing after I saw the location, the views and the price on Booking.com. I ran with the assumption that said typical amenities common in a no-tell motel would be present. Before checking in, I had done some grocery shopping in an effort to not spend too much on eating out. I had unfortunately bought a fair amount of perishables from the Safeway on South Lake Tahoe Boulevard.
I had bought a few books to potentially read in an effort to reduce all sorts of screen time. It wasn’t exactly my intention to stare at a TV or doomscroll on my laptop or phone. Each little hotel stint previously, none of the TV cable offered anything but annoyance. It was actually liberating to have the delusion that I’d find anything of value on a boob tube removed from the proceedings. All I needed were the sour cherry edibles and the mountain air.
If anything I could just enjoy self pleasure in a more peaceful setting than usual. I didn’t need to be entertained by the artificial. I had made it up the mountain in my old ass car. Gracie was a little more cranky than usual after the trek into the land in the sky. The thinner air makes the carbs mix more gas, so she was sluggish on takeoffs from rest. She struggled with idling in the mountain air. I’m sure the winter blend ethanol ‘enriched’ premium wasn’t mixing well with the fact that it was way above freezing. I caught just enough snow still holding court on the grounds as it rapidly evaporated into steam into the crystal clear skies. There was something majestically rooted in ephemera that I had to pay attention to. It was for the best that I didn’t have significant distractions.
I had arrived early enough to enjoy a quick stroll to the lakefront beach. It was warm enough to leave my shearling coat in the hotel room. I’m actually surprised that I didn’t strip down to a t-shirt. I passed a series of empty cabins and said softly to myself:
“…yo, you really chose to be alone!”
I felt I had proved something significant to myself. I had long not had some sense of confidence to go to Tahoe. I didn’t understand the purpose of the place as much as an adult. Some lingering resentments started to creep in. Historically, we didn’t spend much time at the lakefront. I didn’t learn how to ski until I did Outdoor Ed in 8th grade in Yosemite. Even then, it was the surprising difficulty of cross country skiing and not downhill like the majority of the resorts scattered around the lake. Even before I was born, the Jones family purpose for holding property in South Lake Tahoe was to give room to my Aunt Robertine’s gambling itch.
It was only on rare occasions when a cousin got married or we had smaller family reunions that we encountered the nature. I begged, oh how I would beg to go sledding, snow shoeing or skiing. There was so much to do. More often than not my time in Tahoe was limited to watching westerns on the TV, eating Pancakes and running out of quarters at the pitiful arcade next to the valet parking in Harrah’s Casino. If Aunt Robbie won big, at least we got treated to Swordfish dinners at the casino restaurant upstairs.
I sighed a bit of relief that I got to interact with the land. I had chosen to be far away from the consumerism and games of chance further Southeast. I completely ignored reading the ‘bear advisory’ flyer I got with my room keys. I know I remembered to remove all food stuffs out of the car. I might have been new to this part of the lake but I knew the basic laws of the land. I took in the stillness, the softness, the almost perfect temperature as the sun started to lower itself behind the west slope of the Sierras. I started firing off frames via film, as seen.
But I took a series of selfies on my phone giving the double bird. I said recently that your middle finger, ironically, is the perfect length to milk someone’s prostate. The middle finger can be actually a prayer that you get the loving touch you truly need. I posted the shot where my skin radiates the most on the internet as a bored, lonely millennial facing midlife crisis would.
“Fuck the haters” I wrote across the image.
I’m not even sure I have “haters” if we can parse the concepts of envy away from hate. I’ve been told in the last few months that people are actually jealous of the way I live my life. I’m rolling into the middle meat of my 40’s not attached to the stereotypical conundrums that trap my peers in misery. I haven’t married yet. I have no children. Thanks to some crafty medical debt forgiveness work, I no longer have crippling medical debt from 2023. My credit score is decent while that seems to no longer matter in the collapse of American capitalism. I’m sitting on the biggest pile of money I’ve ever had because I told the truth, over and over again.
I sit with some bemusement surrounding those that lied about me out of that envy. I recognize that they were holding onto some sense of possession because they did assist in the rebuilding of my life over the last few years. They put skin in the game that I still truly appreciate. I sit with our respective hidden middle names. I sit with the reality that mine is tellingly is old Hebrew for “may Jehovah add/increase.” It’s a little unique bonus when your first name gifts you a crown of laurels. Theirs ignores their heritage but amps off the willfulness of their first name, showcasing hidden courage. I regret that some of the hidden truths of that combination of names got obscured. One doesn’t need to possess when there’s plenty to be had.
I’m free to consider a whole new life 3,000 miles away from where I originated when most people are starting to feel the steady creeping reality that the years ahead of us are less than more. Time in general is running out. Are we crabs being boiled alive? Probably. I’m happy right now that I’ve figured out how to jump out of the water and at least try to scuttle to freedom. That freedom is temporary, I know. I don’t want to think how well my soft underbelly would go with some melted butter and lemon.
I told myself to sit for a bit. I wanted to see if I could shut it all off. Sitting on the end of the lakeshore pier, I glanced down at the water. It is still luckily true that Lake Tahoe’s waters are still pretty clear. The sloping sands off of Camp Richardson aren’t all that deep, but I could see stones in the water standing stout in the deepening turquoise pushing off the royal blue in front of my eyes. I giddly put my left hand in the water, wondering how actually cold it was. I knew at least the lake waters would have a respect for time and season.
It was delightfully frigid. There’s something beautifully crystalline about frigid water. It’s temperature and pressure can kill in an instant while ironically being full of vibrant life. I froze myself. A little thread of subconscious bubbled up. I remembered my earliest interactions I could remember with this lake. It was Fourth of July, 1986. Nancy, my parents Maltese co-worker, one of the ones that assumed my dad was nowhere near a negro, said it would be a great idea to get away from it all up at Tahoe.
I remembered being at the shore. I remember loving the saltwater sandals I had on. I remembered the tan and vibrant blues. I remember building my first sand castle on the shores of this lake. Why had I not gone back to that moment of beauty for so long? My eyes kept drifting back to those stones. I started recalling scenes from The Deep End. I think of the fictional fates that might not be so fictional that have claimed bodies in and around this lake. There’s a reason why I don’t trust Tilda Swinton in any role she plays despite the fact that woman has never done anything to me. I probably wouldn’t trust her in a grocery store line either.
I didn’t bother to stay ‘til Sunset. I walked back to the hotel room. I showered the sweat of driving through the ungodly out of season Central Valley heat off. I didn’t bother to dress again. I hadn’t bought pajamas or sweats. I had bought swimming trunks for an abortive desire to sit in the hotel hot tub. It was down for maintenance. I popped the edible and just laid in the bed, watching the slow creep of blue to pitch black barely illuminated by path lights take over the parking lot and trees.
Tears started to flow.
I started contrasting the first memory with all the other memories I had been saddled with. It was difficult to reconcile that I had my own foundational memory with this very beautiful place. Yet, almost every memory that followed until I was 15 years old spoke of alienation. It wasn’t just alienation from the landscape via activity choices of the adults trusted with my care. It was alienation from said adults and family at the same time. I wondered if my preference for enjoying what came naturally to me was always at odds with the demands of what my family expected of me.
Aunt Robbie caught the gambling bug once when it was a near blizzard in 1987. I never will understand why my mom and dad decided they wanted to go on this particular trip. I know weather forecasts weren’t as detailed 40 years ago. Still, Sierra snow in February is still Sierra fucking snow in February. I didn’t get why my older cousins weren’t along for the ride. Granted there was only so many seats in the 1980 Impala that was chosen as the ‘snow car’ by that branch of the family. The shortcomings of the smog-choked 267 cube small block Chevy V8 made an unholy alliance with a Turbo Hydramatic transmission. It struggled under the weight of 5 passengers beyond Pollock Pines. My dad argued with his brother that they could put on the chains themselves.
The only way I’ve outlived my complaints about the 8 hour slog up U.S. 50 is because the two that remember me playing pint sized Don Rickles have passed on. A waitress at Heidi’s asked us what brought us in for breakfast in such bad weather. Without the filter yet that one procures in kindergarten, I laid into the poor garnet red on red vinyl bench seat workhorse of a Chevrolet:
“We were snuck in the snow because we were in a lousy old Chevrolet. I’d like the dollar pancakes please, I’m really hungry, thank you.”
Sometimes I think I should change my surname to ‘David.’
When faced with comical circumstances, especially the hubris of others, I’m still prone to curb someone else’s enthusiasm. I started when I was barely out of diapers and haven’t let up since. Aunt Robbie always brought this story out as she would remind me that she won $4,500 that trip. It’s not like I understood then or for years after any of the full benefit to it. I get now it probably helped pay for having the cabin off of Pioneer Trail in the first place. But I didn’t enjoy making at an at least 4 hour trek just for her to gamble.
I actually came to loathe the other family events that pulled us up the mountain. Tahoe wasn’t exactly a place for Black people, then or now. I never got the identity investment in being class privileged enough to hold property in such a place until now. Even with understanding, I still reject the aspiration. It seems still more a headache and a second set of hefty taxes to deal with. I never saw the point of some rituals because I couldn’t ever feel the need for them.
The same went for Lawrence Jr. and Tamara’s wedding in 1990. I didn’t ‘feel’ what I understood as ‘love’ from most any of my relatives. There’s a disconnect if felt that was amplified by witnessing other families that hugged and kissed each other. Those families or couples cuddled up on couches and watched old movies together. Those folks that didn’t forget that it always pays to make a date. All of my relatives sat on separate ends of the couch involved in their own worlds. Even when Aunt Robbie’s gambling streaks hit, we were all left to our own devices in the casino. Uncle Al drank. My mom just ate snacks. I wonder if everyone else was forbidden from touching slot machines to protect her mojo.
I didn’t get the point. I still don’t got very excited when someone gets married. I don’t know if 8 year olds are supposed to get excited about marriage. It seemed to me every other cousin in my age range in the family had excitement about this big glamorous Tahoe wedding. All I saw was my culturally confused ‘oreo’ of a cousin raised in Sunnyvale getting married to a white woman that exclusively shopped at Lane Bryant. The marriage seemed based upon the fact that she was foolish enough to put up with his drinking.
There was nothing of the ‘chemistry’ people talked about in other relationships. He drank to ignore the long gone glory days where he was a star something or other on the Homestead High School football team. The drinking between him and my cousins closer to my mom’s age was incessant the whole 3 day weekend we were up there to celebrate the commencement of this unholy matrimony.
I don’t remember the ceremony, don’t remember the vows. I’m sure there’s long discarded or boxed VHS tapes of the proceedings. I can’t even remember if there was food. I can remember that it was at a lakefront resort. The beach wasn’t far away. The sands of 4 years earlier called to me. To avoid everyone, I decided to entertain myself with castles in the sand. I didn’t know this was breaking the rules of unity. I didn’t know it was outside of conformity to just self soothe within reason when you are overwhelmed by the environment around you. Even at 8, I understood the power of some of the most serene waters in the state.
Something hard and wet hit me in the back of my left shoulder.
Then something hard and wet hit me on my left cheek.
Then multiple pellets of rocks started flying at my back. I stood up, stunned to see my cousins Frankie and Danielle throwing them at me. They book ended me in age. They had looks of glee in their face. They were having fun. American culture finds violece and destruction fun. Who knows, I could have been steps away from being one of those lynching postcards from the south. They were egged on by our cousin Marcus who was a good decade older than all of us. Marcus was saying
“Kill the Fag”
I sort of knew what ‘fag’ meant at the time. I recognized that a lot of factors had labeled me already outside of what society expected me to do. I had always seemed to draw in and be drawn to boys more than girls, even if I already had a reputation for being pretty enough for girls to desire. I was stunned because I just chose to be by myself. I wasn’t bothering anything but the sand.
I landed back from the past. I came back to my body to still feel the impact of the stones thrown at me. Back in the hotel room bed, I understood why I focused on the stones in the lake. Well wish conversations via text got news flashes of what was unfolding in the reminisce, if not the emotion. I dearly love the fact that such an overview was accepted as part of the healing part of this trip. I appreciate that there wasn’t silence. I broke even more that there was care now, even if it was 200 miles away, that I didn’t get then.
I never said anything about what happened at that lakeshore wedding until a few Tuesdays ago. I remember that night I stayed silent. I understood that no one would understand. I knew even then I’d be chastised for telling the truth. I’d be recognized as the problem. I popped myself some Jiffy Popcorn. I was lucky to find that The Love Bug was on the local TV station.
It has long been my comfort movie. It still is when I find myself struggling with the polarity between optimism and bleak realities. I didn’t get ‘til years later how dark that movie is. I now grapple with the reality that the sentient Volkswagen that just wanted to belong to a love story. Herbie would rather kill itself than be replaced as an essential part of the life journey of those it loved.
There’s something that chilled me then about the comfort that I felt when I stuck my hand in the lake earlier. I was frightened that I found a degree of comfort in the icy stillness of the waters. I don’t wish that I weren’t different, out of the norm or anything, but it would be nice to belong to those I think I love sometimes. It would be nice to be claimed for once. It would be nice not to be discarded once my usefulness is used up. These are the truths that I had been carrying since I had been ambushed with the ‘department restructuring’ and severance package. It was the same sting I felt when I was told that I had nonconsensually started the rubbing of thighs underneath the conference room table.
The reality as I experienced it was I had been leaning in for months to touch that had reached out to me first. I had provided it with the keys to my home should it find time and space to take things further. That truth saved me. I had received the warmth and affection that I desperately needed after repeated abandonments. It felt good to be desired publicly. It felt great to feel the flesh underneath the pants. I was angry with myself that I wanted more.
The reminders of what I had missed out on for years at this point were too strong to deny such a natural thrill. It was a life raft that made living seem like it had a point. I was wishing and hoping that someday soon the key would fit in the lock and be turned. The doors would open. There’s plenty of evidence of the beauty it added to my life still dotting the physical and digital landscape.
I had to pay the price for being too honest. I was too honest that I needed space when the complications of the parallel life prevented the subtle turn of a lock I was anticipating. I had been honest about all the details that made even taking such ‘space’ difficult. I had been cast as difficult for being honest. I had believed that being honest that I felt love was the actual correct answer. I didn’t recognize that even my returning love was a threat to so many established orders. I oddly sit in the benefit and bewilderment of stating the truth time and time again. It’s lonely out here. I wish I had stuck to the lessons I took on the last time I built a sand castle:
Tell no one.
Eventually the water reclaims the sand and puts it back in its place. This makes it easy to understand even if I try again and again to rebuild, there’s some that will never consider it worth the effort. I get the pain is sometimes insurmountable to consider starting again. Grains of sand at best either turn into glass or measure the passage of time. They aren’t meant to make something permanent other than something beautiful as change. There’s still wishing and hoping for the best that I’ll stop being penalized for being honest.
There’s something I’d like to build not of my solo creation. There’s understanding that I’m seeking that there’s beauty to be shared when something is built together. Too much of what I’ve made ends up having a melancholy gauze of tears that I power through. I cried myself to sleep, I laid in the bed letting the tears flow as the sun woke after uneasy sleep. I eventually showered again, fixed my hair. It was time for Pancakes. Hell with the already spoiled Kefir in the Safeway bag.
We’ve been friends for oh, so long
I let you share what’s mine
But when you mess with the boy I love
It’s time to draw the lineKeep your hands (keep your hands) off my baby
I ain’t gonna tell you but-a one more time
Oh, keep your hands (keep your hands) off my baby
Girl, you get it through your head
That boy is mineI don’t mind when you lend my clothes
My jewelry and such
But, honey, let’s get something straight
There’s one thing you don’t touch
Heidi’s probably still looks like 1962 turning into 1963 inside. I was laughing at the fact that their main breakfasts ‘short stack’ is still 4 fucking pancakes. I ordered. Barely 10 minutes later pancakes almost fluffier than biscuits came out with ‘maple’ and ‘boysenberry’ syrup with a side of sausage. I stuffed my mouth as if I were 4 years old again and sang along to Little Eva being the first sonic blast from the past I noticed as my food arrived.
Keep your hands (keep your hands) off my baby
Girl, you get it through your head
That boy is mineKeep your hands (keep your hands) off my baby
I ain’t gonna tell you but-a one more time
Oh, keep your hands (keep your hands) off my baby
Girl, you get it through your head
That boy is mine
I can’t decide if I really want to be singing that about someone. Would I prefer that a bear of a man would sing it about me? Who knows, but I love the sensation of having a mouth full of breakfast starch while singing along to a Goffin & King song.
