Read Online Fried & True by Fay Jacobs - Free Book Online Page B

part of a documentary series on gay images on TV. The Saturday showing was The Early Years and included a 1964 episode of Espionage . Filmed in black and white, one year before my high school graduation, the program looked as prehistoric as my prom pictures.
    Jim Backus played a diplomat investigating a rumor that one of his staff was (big wide-eyed intake of breath) “a homosexual.” Lines like “You realize he is an expert in…antique furniture!!!” (gasp!), and “Isn’t he a little…light on his feet?” made the audience wince, then giggle. Frankly, as dreadful as the televised homophobia was, the treatment of women in the episode was even more disturbing, so lots of us have come a long way baby.
    And we went a long way, baby, all weekend. For the record, we’d get dressed for the whole day in the morning, and not return to Mt. Donna Reed until bedtime. One Stairmaster session a day was plenty.
    We spent time downtown in Chelsea and the Village, then uptown to Bloomingdale’s and Broadway. By Sunday, we toasted to our anniversary at a girl bar called The Cubby Hole on West 4th Street in the Village.
    In a very back-to-the-future moment, we played the state-of-the-art satellite jukebox, which can summon every recording ever made, and chose “our” song from 1982—Anne Murray’s “Can I Have This Dance.”
    As we sipped a drink and, to quote Anne Murray, “swayed to the music,” Bonnie slipped a bar matchbook over my way. She’d written our phone number on it, with the words “call me.”
    Cue the Twilight Zone music.
    Okay, we’re back, if not to the future, at least to the present. We’ve got six months to argue about whether to celebrate our anniversary again in August.
    In the meantime, if you happen to be heading to NYC, we heartily recommend the Chelsea Pines Inn. I’m sure my photos have been stripped from the walls by now. And I understand that the James Garner suite is fabulous. It’s on the ground floor.

April 2004
    LETTERS FROM CAMP REHOBOTH
    MOW, MOW, MOW YOUR BOAT
    Much to Bonnie’s relief, I’ve kept the following story to myself for three long years. But the time has come to, well, come out of the closet about the riding mower.
    I’ve decided to do this, since I finally heard a more dramatic lawnmower story than our own. And the new story falls under the mantle of “no event is totally horrible if you can tell a good story about it.”
    So just let me say that when my friends up the street told me their lawnmower tale, I had to tell you ours.
    I’ll start by saying the obvious. Almost nothing is private in this town. I say “almost,” because the truth about our lawnmower has somehow eluded the community hotline. It’s about the only thing that has.
    If I show up at a CAMP event or some happy hour with a friend in tow but no Bonnie, she’ll get a call within minutes wanting to know who I’m running around with. Don’t try to pull anything off in this town. The whole population works for Magnum P.I .
    We were practically on the news when one of our cars went to the shop. Coming home we stopped by our local fancy car lot to ogle. Bonnie stared adoringly at a Mercedes convertible and the proprietor, to stem her drooling on it, offered to let Bonnie drive it for the day. With our car in the shop, it was an offer we couldn’t refuse.
    Not fifteen minutes after I got back to my office, I got not one but two phone calls congratulating us on the new convertible. In the seven minutes my spouse had been home, two busy buddies cruised by the driveway and zeroed in on the trophy car.
    â€œGet that thing back to its home NOW!” I hollered to Bonnie, not wanting to spend the rest of the day denying thepurchase or the rest of the year convincing people we hadn’t bought a sexy speedster in lieu of paying the mortgage.
    Which brings me back to the riding mower. One