Philadelphia fun

I rented a car in Philadelphia, and decided to drive to the Philadelphia Outlet Malls, 35 miles outside of the “city.” It took two hours – crazy traffic. Where, I wondered, where all of these drivers trying to get to? King of Prussia? Ho-ho-kus? By the time I got to the outlet malls, I was crazy late, so I dashed into a Banana Republic and bought a dress shirt and a more casual shirt, and I dashed into a Puma store for some underwear. At the Puma store, the high school girl at the register showed me which underwear was men’s (they were all on the same rack) but whenever I saw a pair I liked, I looked at the tag and there was a woman on it. I didn’t want to inadvertently buy women’s underwear, though it wouldn’t be the first time that my tastes in clothing have led me to the women’s section by accident. So I bought a boring 3-pack of boxer briefs. Amazingly, I stayed under budget, for once. I then got back in the car and drove back to my hotel, then tried to drive to the dance performance at Temple University. The traffic was insane again, and I didn’t even get there in time. Jeremy was texting me, and eventually I gave up trying to reach Temple, and drove back to the hotel again, where Jeremy met me. One of the many things I learned that night was that Jeremy is a Republican. A gay Republican! I can hardly believe it. Of course, that made me want him more. Since part of romance is violence, I love being romantic with people whose views I don’t share, or who are distant, etc., so that I can get out my anger and frustrations on these stand-ins for whole groups of people, whole ways of life. We spoke a bit about economic theory, but neither of us was budging from our points of view. I did explain, though, that I’m a Democrat in name only – really, I’m a libertarian-slash-socialist, though that may seem like an oxymoron. I guess I want all individuals to be free to be like everyone else, though that doesn’t sound right. If I really wanted that, wouldn’t I shop at the Gap more? Anyway, the next day, I was caught in more traffic (and street closings) on my way to the Philadelphia Museum of Art to see the Frida Kahlo exhibit. I gave up again and drove to the train station. How ironic that I thought I would be able to symbolically snub Mrs. Clinton and Obama on this trip, when in reality, they hampered my ability to get around with their Secret Service-mandated street closings and such!!! A week later I tried on the casual shirt from Banana Republic, and I looked hideous in it. Ugh, it was so shiny and blue. But Jeremy contacted me that day and told me again how much fun he’d had, and I fell in love with Philadelphia and all its contents again. I’ll be there again on June 2nd, for Paul Taylor Dance (for reals this time, yo!) on Jeremy’s birthday weekend. I’m going to give him an unbelievably big present.