Florida Postcards II: "Honey, you can do anything you want!"

My memory of our first night in Key West revolves around two statements uttered that evening. One was when Veronica emphatically slurred, "I am not gay!" Like Georgia, V felt compelled, by the end of that first night in Key West, to set complete strangers straight on that subject. This was after we stumbled into a drag show and V got hit on by a lesbian. V let her admirer buy her a drink, I might add, even though she declined to dance with her and later felt the need to frequently proclaim her sexual preference to everyone. But I get ahead of myself.

The first and defining quote is from the beautiful woman, (our best friend!) manning the frozen daiquiris lined up behind her like slurpee machines in a 7-11, who said, "Honey, you can do anything you want!" Veronica and I looked at the waitress incredulously and then at each other suspiciousy. (We had been waiting our whole lives to hear those words.) Apparently we could actually take our refillable thermos containers holding enough key lime dacquiri for a small army with us. And then we could come back and refill them. Perfect.

Transformed, we were 15 again, sitting on the hood of our friend Betty's big brother's car out on some country road with a case of cold long-neck beer between us. It felt so normal to be in each others' presence again, as if we still had identical blonde streaks on the same side of our long hair. As if we hadn't gone off and lived our own separate lives but had somehow, unbeknownst to us, remained connected, like some deep sad joy that Siamese twins share.

But let's back up a little, to the moment when we stepped off the boat and had our first glimpse of shops and restaurants and boats and tanned bodies and the smell of fish and open air and ocean. Heaven. We dragged and wrestled our suitcases about a half-mile (actually V carried hers because she had some special designer suitcase or something, the kind that people buy who never have to carry their own bags) because the girl at the hotel had told V that the hotel was a half-block away from the docks. Sweating from the climb up and down busy tourist-filled boardwalk ramps, we were thankful for the airconditioned lobby and didn't even mind that our room wasn't ready. We headed straight for the hotel bar where we spent three hours admiring the ocean and enjoying free drinks that the cute young waiter concocted especially for us. "I'll make you my specialty. It's called a 'Dead Head'. You'll like it. Tell me if it isn't the best drink you've had." He then went into a flurry of activity with a mortar and pestle, about 20 different liquors and things chocolatey and minty and fruity. "This is definitely the best drink I have ever had," I said soberly.

Later we admired the view of the ocean from our fourth-floor balcony. A group of boys played Marco Polo in the pool below, and parasails floated over the blue water. We hungrily headed for Duval Street, where we had a remarkable seafood dinner and key lime martinis. We then were drawn into Sloppy Joes, a bar that looked hopping but where the drinks were skunky and next to us a drunk middle-aged woman slowly humped an embarrassed middle-aged man's thigh and where delighted dwarves danced and whooped in front of the band, which consisted of middle-aged hippies playing Jimmy Buffett songs. Leaving my full glass on the bar, V and I snaked our way out into the street.

"Let's walk for a while." V wanted to see the six-toed cats, and "I think we passed the Hemingway House, let's say we did. Wasn't it beautiful?" Suddenly the sidewalk ended and our feet were in sand at the southernmost point of the United States. I wanted to go into the ocean, but V had seen where the action was, and steered us back toward the drag show. The guys out on the sidewalk had been so cute and inviting. "You coming to the show? Another one starts at midnight! Come back! You'll love it!"

We loved it. V and I sat at the bar and were totally absorbed in the carnival atmosphere as the three "girls" took turns strutting around and lip-synching to songs like "Let's Hear it for the Boy" and "Dancing Queen". During a song that asked "So you wanna see my pussy?" the stunning and statuesque drag queen in her bouffant blonde wig demurely lifted her ruffled petticoats to reveal panties with a furry kitten sewn to the front. Charming and in-your-face. The audience stumbled over each other to slide dollar bills into their "cleavage". They were likeable, and vulnerable, and talented and fun. V and I agreed that we love gay men. And gay men love V. She's beautiful.

Gay women also seem to love V. A 40-ish woman (a dyke, V corrected me) approached V from behind, put her arm around her, asked if she could buy V a drink and asked her to dance. She told V, "You should take a walk on the wild side," and replied, "What a shame, you would be wonderful to be with," when V uttered her first "I'm not gay" proclamation. "Have you ever considered it? Your friend is on the edge, isn't she?" She came back a couple of times to see if V had changed her mind and then withdrew and became lost in her little crowd of uninhibited dancers.

Stumbling out of the club, we were greeted by drag queens thanking us for coming, giving us hugs. I love the way drag queens challenge the meaning of gender. It is good to have our ideas of conventional sexuality confronted and contested. Their performances challenge our subjective mindset, and that is good, art should do that. It should put us off balance, give us moments of cognitive dissonance that allow new ideas to enter our tired old mental landscape. Like the East Village, I love the inclusiveness of this place.

V and I looked forward to parasailing the next day as I crawled into bed and V happily uncorked a bottle of wine.