doesn’t seem like i’ve been in los angeles for a week. but guess what, i have. i’ve been doing a great job of keeping myself busy, but i sure as hell miss my london life, my london friends. but i’m moving on.

i’ve been having a brilliant time with my long-lost l.a. friends, doing l.a. things in the l.a. sun.

friday

went out with cousin jason and his gorgeous girlfriend allison to a few [straight/surfer/sport] bars here in huntington beach on friday, which was… fun. probably the most foreign i’ve felt in a long time, but as they saying goes, when in rome… drink with the straight surfer boys. the bouncer was friendly after looking me up-and-down about 5 times. the stunning, coyote ugly-esque bartender wearing little more than a bikini top and daisy duke jeans was quite friendly to me… must’ve sussed that i’m a well-tipping gay boy alchie. i didn’t poke fun at the dancefloor until we will rock you came blaring through the soundsystem at 130am and the crowd cheered like frat boys on spring break.

saturday

after many many years, joshie finally invited me to manhattan beach to meet the fam. sat down to a lovely hom-cooked meal with his mom, sis, coworkers and bogart—who’s celebrating his 22nd birthday. i’d last seen the boys last year at disneyland, and they haven’t changed a bit. they both seemed too too excited to see me… i had to warn/remind them that i live here now, and that they’re gonna get tired of me rill, rill quick.

tiptoed over to a gross local gay bar, called the dolphin… the bar gods were seeking their revenge on me after poking fun at the straight huntington beach dive that i was at the previous night. we made the best of it, though, ending up at hermosa beach where none of the ogre-like bouncers would let us in [too many mens, not enough wimmins] so we trotted back to josh’s place, and sat in the front yard like hillbillies, drinking and chatting till the wee hours. i felt very much at home.

spent most of the night poking fun at josh’s coworker gio, who looked/acted/sounded like wilmer
valderram [aka fez from that 70's show]. he denied any resemblance, even though i was confused when some girl named lindsay kept calling him all night.

last night

i’m so lucky to finally, finally live in the same city as my christopher. he’s intelligent, witty, sarcastic, handsome, charming and always, always seems to able to handle whatever i throw his way. together, we’ve explore the likes of england, ireland, amsterdam, san fran, san diego and now los angeles. with great excitement, i drove 14 hours up to silverlake to chill with the king of cool.

he took me to an excellent, kitschy-but-quality restaurant/lounge called the dresden. like being transported back to rat pack-era vegas, we dined like kings, with mafioso at the table across from ours, hooting and hollering as we all ate some juicy steaks.

in 5 hours, we managed to catch up on a year or so of drama and stories and boyfriends and projects and… life. we ate, we drank, and we witnessed a legendary lounge act, the 65yo husband-and-wife team of marty and elayne. i even found a video of the duo in action.

chris and i have the most playful, most adult friendship, and i can’t wait to watch as he grows to be an even bigger success, and i can drag myself along as his plus one to celebrity parties and backstage soirées at award shows. what? i’m not supposed to mention that yet? oops…

it’s so great to have friends to reconnect with, it really is. i’d be a miserable little lad right now if i didn’t have my l.a. posse here to keep me in check.

or, try to to keep me in check.

i feel a bit of an idiot being inside on such a perfect summer day. but, after being in huntington beach for nearly a week, it’s becoming obvious that the weather is always perfect. not very exciting, i know.

i so do not fit in to this neighborhood. picture me: walking around in my jeans and cowboy shirt, bleached hair all spiked up, pasty white, wearing grey gray socks. sweating in the summer sun, walking quickly to nowhere in particular.

dozens of boys waxing their surfboards, girls leisurely biking by on their beach cruisers, little kids skateboarding better than anyone i saw over four years in london. everyone barely dressed, perfectly tanned, and perfectly ripped. i mean, seriously, 90% of the people here are stunningly, perfectly gorgeous.

not sure if the teevee show emulates the real orange county, or the other way around, but all the boys here have scraggly floppy surfer curls, whereas my big-city over-processed dye job kinda stands out. and i like that.

fortunately, my four years of gay adolescence in london have left me with supreme confidence, and i’m completely happy with who i am. i’m lucky to not have the body image issues that i had years ago [and that most people experience in their lives] because i’d be freakin’ freakin’. i think it also helps that i’m not particularly attracted to the [stereotypically] ditsy, tanned, six-pack surfer persona, which is strange because i’m pretty sure i used to be.

walking past the hundreds of gorgeous clones, sipping my grande nonfat iced mocha valencia, by the beach and outside the dozens of surf shops and bar-n-grills, it felt pretty good to stand out, just a bit. and, thankfully, all of l.a. isn’t like this—i just happen to be in a surfer’s mecca. i dig it, though. people here are friendly, so incredibly laid back, and it’s just so incredibly… pleasant.

i’ll be retreating to the big-city comforts of west hollywood soon, but in the meantime it’s nice to enjoy this only-in-cali slice of hippy life.

tuesday was when it all finally hit me—i don’t live in london any longer.

on the plane flight i finally cracked open eric’s big black book, the signature/farewell book that i laid out at my leaving party all those weeks ago. flipping through the book, i was laughing out loud at page after page of drunken, loving, friendly scrawl from friends, exes, and acquaintances. the businessman sat next to me kept peeking, but i hid it from him, keeping all of the lovin’ all to myself.

heading down to the luggage carousel at l.a.x., it all looked so familiar. all those mid-term flights during university, of course, i’ve done this many times before. and, of course, i used to live in l.a. i somehow managed to forget that in all my planning and stressing and griping. what the hell am i so worried about?

within minutes i was in my rental car, speeding down the 5-lane 405 freeway, rocking out to kroq, which of course was playing the exact same playlist as when i left l.a. in 1999. of course. i laughed out loud as i put on my sunglasses, zipped into the fast lane and turned it up just a little bit more.

i have several large adjustments to digest… i need to adjust to american life, american politics, the american media. i need to adjust to the california attitude, the california climate, the california tan. i need to feel at home in los angeles, on the freeways, no left turns anywhere, scrounging for parking. i need to stop pretending to be exotic or foreign or british. i need to just be me.

rather than try to digest the shocking differences and amusing subtleties around every corner, i’m pretty much just ignoring them all for now. so what if everything is foreign to me still? i might as well start accepting it, start fitting in, force myself to feel at home.

i’ve managed to get rid of most of my british-isms, although i don’t think i’ll ever be able to say moh-bill instead of moe-bile. or bring myself to wear white socks. but that doesn’t matter… what matters is that i’m happy, i’m getting the things done that i need to get done, and i’m reconnecting with family and friends that i’m going to be seeing a hell of a lot more of.

that’s not to say i don’t miss my london crew… i’ve managed to keep myself distracted with the errands of moving to a new city, but it’s dawning on me, very quickly, that i’ve left a huge part of me behind in london. and, although i’ve only been gone 3 weeks, i’m already feeling those friendships drift apart. it takes effort to maintain friendships across 8 time zones, i know this. it would help if my mobile cell phone had better reception.