Thursday, October 25th 2007

Peters_girl asked me to write a bit about P’town. I would be glad to; it is definitely one of my most favorite places on this Earth that I have been to so far. Here in Palm Springs there are a handful of people that I see that I used to see back East and we all miss that quaint little village on the tip of Massachusetts; especially around this time of year. By about mid September the tourist swell has subsided and the streets empty a bit, exposing those little shops that you forgot were there. The people that you saw and met at the townie mixers in May and June all of a sudden reappear and you ask them, “Where were you all summer?” They respond with the same question and you realize then that you were both here traveling the same path up and down the same street to go to work, but missed each other in the throng of strollers and bike goers.

By October it’s just the locals. You’re hanging out with your “new old friends”, connections are reinforced and friendships blossom unobstructed by jobs, rents and visitors. The air is crisp with the trees waving their leaves of fire above the pubs that all serve “the best” clam chowder. The sweatshirt that you bought in July at half price becomes your favorite item as the days get shorter and you can no longer ride your bike in the “Provincetown” tank top you got the same day.

This is the time where people start asking each other where they will be moving onto. The season is coming to a close and the shops have started to shorten their hours dramatically much to your inconvenience. The trees have lost most of their fiery fingers and have either dropped them to the ground or replaced them with a boring and uneventful brown. As you walk trying to find an open lunch spot you notice that your breath is visible. You wonder about that offer to wait tables in Ft. Lauderdale or whether you are going brave the elements of winter and collect unemployment.

I never was that brave. If I was going to be cold and suffer through winter I was doing it in the city with taxis, bars, my friends and snow plows. P’town was more than beautiful in the winter, don’t get me wrong. I visited it often to escape the congestion and pressure of the city. Unfortunately in winter, aside from the desolate beauty, the only thing flourishing in P’town is ice and alcoholism; a grand combination if not a bit depressing.

P’town was my first real home away from home. I grew up there and I met people there and they would soon become the most treasured people in my life. I fell in “love” there and I fell out again. I partied on the beach at night and relaxed in hammocks next to the black bottom pool during the day. It was there that I met guys from all over the world and now have a place to stay in virtually every state. After three summers working at the best spots in town I will always see somebody I know and chances are it was from those times, on the very tip of Massachusetts, the tiny town that Johnny calls home.

This entry was posted by Johnny on Thursday, October 25th, 2007 at 10:53 AM and is filed under Anthropology, Local Color & Atmosphere. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed.

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