ever gone speedwalking shortly after gorging on an Independence Day barbeque and binge drinking? . . . getting shitfaced can be lots of fun just so long as i don’t do it as often as some of my housemates . . . but we only drink like this when we’re out here they rationalize . . . ahhhhh, rationalization . . . so helpful when it comes to drink, drugs and sex . . . it gave me an excuse to cross a new line, and just as the crystal backlash appears to be gaining new momentum . . . if U went to the Gay Pride parade this year, U know exactly what i mean . . . a mobile traffic sign proclaiming "Crystal Meth: Nothing To Be Proud Of" followed shortly after the stroller-pushing gay parents, demarcating the two poles of queer life as we know it in 2004 . . . i even spotted a couple of hunky spectators wearing “Tina Is No Friend Of Mine” t-shirts exchanging phone numbers . . . a Times wedding announcement that says “the couple met at a CMA meeting” can’t be far behind.

but when i entered the meatrack, considerably more sober than when i started out 90 minutes earlier, my voice hoarsened by singing along with Avril Lavigne's “Don’t Tell Me” far too loudly and way too often during my four mile walk, i was thinking only about getting my rocks off . . . none of the younger guys seemed to be having much problem . . . whoever determines the rigid Pines schedule has decreed that pre-tea is prime time for daylight cruising in the meatrack (has this activity finally lost some of its stigma? one recent afternoon i saw at least half a dozen small groups of men going at it in very public spots) . . . nobody paid me much attention until i passed a bear with a close-cropped beard and a circle of mostly gay flags tattoos around his initials on his shoulder who screamed sex pig . . . follow me, fella . . . he did and we began going at it immediately.

it didn’t take him long to suggest that we light the pipe . . . i remained silent at first, perfectly content to have legally intoxicated sex but when it became pretty clear that refusal wasn’t going to be an option i decided what the hell . . . i need to see what all the fuss is about and besides, what have i got to lose now that i have quit my job? . . . he wanted to move to a more private area . . . i took him deep into the dunes to a small clearing so seldom used that it wasn’t littered with the trash that spoils the more heavily trafficked areas . . . if he thought i would take him home, he had the wrong guy: no way was i going to introduce Tina to my housemates the first time i met her!

truth be told, she and i didn’t get along all that well anyway . . . maybe i didn’t give her a chance, but first impressions do count, U know . . . she kinda got in the way, sort of like your kid sister who’s always whining for attention when your parents are out of town and all U want to do is shut the bedroom door and jerk off with the guy on the swim team who keeps returning your glances in the locker room after practice . . . i mean here’s this hot guy whose face makes me practically swoon and who kisses really well and now we have to stop what we’re doing and move to a different area to light the pipe . . . okay maybe this did give us the opportunity to take off all our clothes but just as i’m starting to enjoy the heat of his furry body pressed against mine he stops and reaches into his backpack . . . out comes a glass tube with a hollow bubble at the end and a miniature version of what i’m thinking we should have used to light the coals for the barbeque . . . he takes the first hit and then shotguns the smoke into my mouth as we begin a deep kiss . . . as soon as i exhale he takes another hit and then hands me the pipe . . . we repeat the sequence and i’m feeling a rush of euphoria which does greatly intensify the sensuality of the experience . . . it also gives me a sense of confidence without altering my consciousness . . . if anything, i’m superconscious . . . the little grunts he’s making in my ears are turning me on as much as his mouth on my chewing my nipple or sucking my cock . . . and then i suddenly realize my dick isn’t quite as hard as it usually is.

houston, we have a problem when somebody has his tongue as deep in my ass as Pluto's orbit and i’m not in ramrod mode . . . at first i’m wondering if maybe i’ve had too much sex lately . . . or maybe i’m just not responding to the heterosexual porn fantasy that he began spinning as soon as we got high . . . i mean, i know i’m high . . . why else would i be trash talking about eating pussy and having a threesome every Tuesday night with the beautiful young couple who lives directly across the street from me in the city? . . . i’m the kind of guy who can barely deliver a gay porn cliche when called upon to do so . . . sure i can turn into Barbara Walters afterward, but during the act of sex mum is usually the word for me, not her pussy juice is dripping from my mouth . . . thank U Margaret Cho for helping me fake it!

it’s not that i’m not enjoying myself . . . and it’s true that our encounter is lasting much longer than my usual but Tina keeps interrupting the natural ebb and flow of sex . . . when he stops to light the pipe a second time i begin wondering how we’re going to make our way through the deep thicket of bushes that surround us . . . maybe that’s the problem: Tina keeps me too much in my head, eager to verbalize, when eats, shoots and leaves is my preferred sequence of events during anonymous sex . . . i can’t say that i’m sorry when finally he comes, long before i am even remotely ready . . . but neither am i particularly eager to leave his company.

i’ve never done this before i confess . . . i mean smoked crystal . . . he looks at me incredulously and says u could have fooled me before quickly adding don’t do it too often . . . Tina interjects yeah, i was pretty convincing wasn’t i? . . . she also encourages me to accept his offer to accompany him for a slice of pizza in the Grove even though i’m penniless, barefoot and barechested . . . i get a little nervous when he reaches into his backpack again but this time he pulls out a sleeveless Key West Fire Department and hands it to me with a smile.

eating pizza together proves to be the most awkward part of the evening . . . when i comment on how often he checks out the people passing by our table--including some couple he had sex with before me--he responds u told me back there u weren’t the marrying kind . . . hmmmmmm, and u told me that i was your first of the day . . . a little later he explains that his ex-lover, with whom he still shares property in two places, didn’t accompany him to the beach today as planned because they had a fight . . . he also calls me by the wrong name when i put him on the 11:30 p.m. boat.

i walk away feeling that letting him buy me a slice was a mistake and head straight back to the meatrack even though i insisted i would be returning to the Pines along the beach . . . i eat and shoot twice before leaving, fulfilled only in the sense that i know that my sex addiction won’t be taking a back seat to Tina anytime soon . . . but then again, maybe that’s why breaking up with her is so hard to do: people who need crystal meth for sex associate lighting the pipe with orgasm, something that no twelve-step program can help U live without . . . cuz who would want to?