Pride Cookout - A Busy Pre-Pride Weekend

This weekend has a number of events running up to Pride week (several already took place last night), including the first Ocean View Pier Party of 2011 which kicks off at 5:00 PM this afternoon (a $5 donation is being collected at the door). The Ocean View Pier is located at 4th View and I-64 on the beach. A full schedule of weekend events can be found here.

*
As noted a couple of days ago, the boyfriend and I are hosting (with help from friends) a fundraising event at our home at 1615 Chesapeake Avenue in Hampton tomorrow to help underwrite the costs of putting on both Hampton Road Pride's "Out in the Park" in Norfolk's Town Point Park on Sunday, June 5, 2011 and the City of Hampton's "Diversity and Pride" in Hampton's Millpoint Park which will take place on Saturday, June 11, 2011.

*

The event tomorrow is from 4:00 PM to 8:00 PM. The menu will include BBQ numerous side dishes, desserts, beer, wine and other beverages - compliments of the boyfriend, myself and friends who will be recognized at the event. The cost is $15 pre-paid or $25 at the door.

*

Local readers who would like to attend and show their support for "Out in the Park" and Hampton's "Diversity and Pride" events need to come out! To purchase tickets, use this link here now.

Pier Party a Huge Success

Last night's white party at the Ocean View Fishing Pier was a great time and the turnout was huge. What struck me was the diversity within the LGBT community - we had a rainbow of ethnic/racial groups , young and older, and from circuit boy twinks to older bears. The music was great and a huge number of folks got into the dancing under the clear sky and a gorgeous moon rise over the Atlantic Ocean in the distance. Indeed, the only mishap was some friends getting their BMW stuck in the sand on the edge of the unpaved overflow parking area. The photo above is some of us after the car was pulled out by a tow truck. We skipped the after party at the HeBar in Norfolk, one of the few LGBT bars in the area that has been willing to upgrade and put money back into the establishment to provide a more appealing and upscale atmosphere (The Wave is another venue that has upgraded nicely).
*
An added plus was that I meet Kevin Clay, the editor and publisher of GayRVA who was down from Richmond since the beneficiary of the admission charge at the door was Equality Virginia. We communicated before and read each other's work but had never met face to face. The Richmond attendees were amazed at the size of the turnout and the great venue with panoramic views across Chesapeake Bay. Hopefully, Kevin and I will be ableto collaborate more in the future.

*

While last night was supposed to be the last pier party of the season, by popular demand another one will be held on Saturday, September 25, 2010. The photo below is a shot of the crowd earlier in the evening before the place got truly packed.

Ocean View White Party

Tonight is the last of the summer's series of white parties at the Ocean View pier - today's featured non-profit is Equality Virginia. The white parties are great fun and an opportunity to see friends not seen in ages. Attendance has run in the 750+ area and today's weather forecast is perfect. I hope local readers will consider coming to the event. The Ocean View pier is conveniently located at the foot of the 4th View exit of Interstate 64. Parking can be challenging, so come early, grab something to eat and dance the evening away under the stars. Hope to see you there.

Pride Weekend Reflections

Despite the very, very hot weather, this weekend's Pride events in Hampton Roads seemed to have come off without a hitch. Things got underway yesterday with an always popular pier party at the Ocean View Fishing Pier - the door proceeds went to help finance the Hampton Roads Men's Chorus. I am not sure what the total attendance numbers turned out to be, but during the 4:00 PM til 10:00 PM and later event, I suspect that the total numbers were 750 to 1000. The pier parties are always an interesting study in contrast with the LGBT party goers of every age bracket and description - certainly not our detractors' stereotype image - partying away on the top deck while redneck Bubba types are fishing on the pier. Fortunately, this year two additional bars were operating on the top deck to help cut down the log jam getting drinks.

*

Out in the Park today seemed the best organized ever and even included a local auto dealership as one of the exhibitors. Also new were several new churches - including Eastern Shore Chapel, one of the oldest Episcopal Church parishes in Virginia Beach - MetLife, the district management for Farmers Insurance, and several mainstream advertising home improvement/construction companies. While this area's Pride event is nothing compared to many cities, the fact that it's taking place - this was the 22nd annual event - and growing speaks a lot to the change taking place in the region, albeit way to slowly for my satisfaction. Working the HRBOR site at Out in the Park I discovered that LOTS of folks saw yours truly on the Friday evening news discussing HRBOR's meeting with Economic Development personnel from the City of Hampton.

City of Hampton Pride Event Recap and Upcoming Events

Though quite hot, the weather cooperated wonderfully for yesterday's Diversity and Pride event in downtown Hampton - the City's first ever Pride event. I was there for roughly six hours marketing the law firm and manning a table for HRBOR. While the crowd was not overly large, for a first time event the sponsors - St. Mark's Episcopal Church and the Williamsburg Unitarian Church - were pleased with the event and it was obvious that the attendees enjoyed the day. Among the local celebrities in attendance were Mayor Molly Ward and TV anchor Barbara Ciara who were judges for a karaoke contest and Congressman Bobby Scott (pictured above). Congressman Glenn Nye was not in attendance, but was represented by staffers who circulated amongst the crowd.

*

Hampton Roads area's Pride events will continue next weekend, first with a white party event at the Ocean View Fishing Pier to benefit the Hampton Roads Men's Chorus on Saturday, June 26, 2010. These events are hugely popular and locals should try to attend (the boyfriend and I will definitely be there):

The festivities will conclude on Sunday, June 27, 2010 with "Out in the Park" to be held at Chesapeake City Park as per the flyer set out below. This year organizers hope to break the 10,000 mark in terms of attendance. Your's truly will be there on behalf of HRBOR and my law firm.

Hampton Roads Pride Week

Just a reminder that the City of Hampton's first ever Pride and Diversity Event will take place in Millpoint Park on June 19, 2010. As previously noted, there have been some organizational changes, and the helm of organizing the event are St. Mark's Episcopal Church in Hampton and Unitarian Universalist congregation in Williamsburg. These non-profit, gay supportive organizations will be giving all net proceeds derived from the event to local charities. In addition to food, wine, beer and vendors, organizations and businesses that want to promote themselves can secure a booth for $50.00. For more information contact St. Marks at (757) 826-3515 0r go to the church's website: http://www.stmarkshampton.org/.

*

This event will be the kick off for a week long Pride theme that will culminate with HP Pride's "Out in the Park" on June 27, 2010 at Chesapeake City Park off of Greenbrier Parkway in Chesapeake. The HR Pride website has all of the details.

Also, on Saturday June 26, 2010 there will also be another fabulous pier party at the Ocean View Fishing Pier just off 4th View Street in Norfolk.

End of Summer Pier Party to Benefit Equality Virginia

Through the combined efforts of some friends, there will be one last 2009 Pier Party at the Ocean View Pier at 4th View Street and West Ocean View Avenue in Norfolk. The last two pier parties had over 700 attendees and I encourage all local readers to make an effort to attend both to network, reunite with friends, and support the raffle to support Equality Virginia. I was at the last pier party - and actually ran into a reader of this blog who I had never previously met - and the boyfriend and I had a wonderful time. As for politicians running for office, the event would be a perfect time for the candidate or represents from their campaign to do some outreach to the LGBT community. So far none of the statewide candidates have made any outreach efforts to our community.

Successful Fund Raiser

The fundraiser for TACT - the Tidewater AIDS Crisis Taskforce - Saturday night was hugely successful with a turn out of perhaps 300 attendees and significant funds were collected to support this worthwhile non-profit organization. The weather was great with a cooling breeze sweeping in off of Chesapeake Bay and the Atlantic Ocean. What is equally exciting about the pier party fundraisers (there have been three this summer) is that they have also provided a wonderful venue for other LGBT related organizations to interact and hopefully in time work more in concert with one another to wield more influence throughout this relatively backwards area. The photos above give a flavor of the event and I am pictured below - second from left - with friends. Also well represented were officers and members of Hampton Roads OUTreach Center’s (HROC) which is working to develop a LGBTQ community center for Hampton Roads. A number of other LGBT and LGBT friendly organizations were likewise well represented.

Weekend Reflections

I spent the majority of my weekend with my new boy friend and had a wonderful time. Friday night we went and saw Mama Mia - it's a great movie, especially if one is an ABBA fan - and than we went to his gorgeous home in Hampton, Virginia. Hampton was founded in 1610 and is the oldest continuously occupied English settlement in the United States and it is located on the other side of Hampton Roads harbor from where I live. Saturday brought a relaxing morning, followed by a number of hours at the office and then last night we went to the TACT fundraiser at the Ocean View Pier I mentioned earlier in the week - the turn out was huge - and we both had a great time and danced under the stars (he's a great dancer, thank goodness since I love to dance). Today we had a leisurely day and spent the afternoon lazing by one of his friends' pool in another neighborhood in Hampton. The pool crowd was an interesting mix of straights and gays and was a very pleasant time.

*

As for my boy friend, I'm not sure how to describe him. First, he is blond and has green eyes and is a little shorter than me. He's not that much younger than me - four years younger in fact - but he has a very boyish look to him and a very sweet and playful heart. Oh, and he's very romantic. He treats me wonderfully and I am still getting used to feeling worthy of such attention and affection. I feel a real sense of peace when I am with him and hope that I give him the same feeling. I confessed to him that I am a little bit afraid. No one has ever seemed to treasure me so in a relationship and I truly do not want to be hurt again after my tumultuous last relationship. I'm trying to do what my former therapist lectured me to do - live in the moment and enjoy the wonder of his company and not let myself over think everything. As things play out I will come to know if he's truly "the one." So far, things are looking good and he is giving me much happiness. As I said, I hope that I can give him the same.

Father's Day Thoughts

So far my day has been pretty good. I went to church - and probably will need to get back to going more regularly since I am subletting part of my office space to the Lutheran Council of Tidewater to help with the overhead until the real estate market picks up again, whenever that might be - and then I met my two daughters for brunch at No Frill Grill here in Ghent and about two blocks from my church. We had a great visit and my oldest brought me up to date on the summer swim league team that she coaches at the pool where I was once on the board and pool president for two terms. She has 254 swimmers on her team ranging in age from 5 to 18. She loves coaching and is a natural talent with kids. I think she will be a great counselor when she starts her full time position at a Virginia Beach high school in August. The first swim meet is on this coming Saturday and I may go to watch the team hopefully beat a mean spirited arch rival team.

*

My younger daughter has two days off from work and is as busy as ever and will be going to Richmond later today to see a friend and then on to Washington, D.C., where a band she knows is putting on a show. They are both smart, poised young women and I am ever so proud of them. As is typical, our conversation also included politics and their strong desire to see Obama elected as president. My oldest who voted a straight GOP ticket (other than for Bush) in her first election experience plans to vote a straight Democrat ticket this year. She is one of many younger voters that the Chimperator, Karl Rove and the Christianists have driven from the GOP.
*

The TACT fundraiser yesterday had a huge turn out of probably 350 to 400 people. I avoided playing volleyball and read a book and worked on my tan from about 1:30 PM until 5:00PM when the party/fundraiser began. In addition to food and adult beverages, there war a great DJ and we had a fair group who danced for hours. It was a great event although it was weird having large numbers of red-neck fishermen on the pier below the upper deck where the event was held. I will confess to being naughty: I wore a white shirt - there was a white party theme - that had the legend "Stop Gay Oppression - Spay ot Neuter and Evangelical" aross the chest. Needless to say, I wore a shirt over it when descending down to the pier level. : )

*

Thankfully, the wind has finally shifted today from a south southwesterly direction so that for the first time in days we are not getting blanketed with smoke and/or awful smells from the wild fires burning in northeaster North Carolina. The sunset on the pier last night was surreal due to the sun setting in a haze of smoke particles which created a pink/red glow in the sky. Fortunately, up on the Bay the smell was nowhere near as bad as in other parts of the metropolitan area.

Saturday Thoughts

I am moving a little slower than usual this morning since the roommates talked me into going to The Wave last night and we ended up closing the place. Friday night is less crowded than Saturday night which is usually filled to capacity with a line to get in at times waiting for people to leave. The music was less non-stop club music but was still good for dancing - the main reason I go out typically - and a different crowd than that on Saturday. Ironically, I ended up dancing much of the time with a young Navy guy - after all, one must support our men in uniform. :)

*

One of the reasons I decided to go the club - and plan on going to a volleyball tounament and TACT fundraiser at the the Oceanview Pier this afternoon/evening is that I've decided that I need to start varying my social life and going to a larger assortment of social events. Otherwise I will be acting like the SBC as described in my prior post: expecting different results from the same conduct which has failed to work to date. There is a great post on Gaytwogether - a blog I read daily that looks at gay relationship issues and provides some good "self-help" articles authored/edited by another Michael who is a real sweetheart - that looks at "Meeting Mr. Right." The piece indicates that repeating more of the same social pattern that has failed to yield boyfriend material is not the way to find that special guy. Here are a few highlights:

*

Perhaps the best definition of madness I've heard is "doing the same thing over and over again, expecting different results." Yet this is exactly what many of us do. We keep living our lives the same old way and things stay pretty much the same as they always have. We are waiting for lightning to strike us.
*

Where are you investing your time? If you're a gay man and you want to meet other gay men, are you spending time where you are likely to find them? Someone once asked bank robber Willie Sutton why he robbed banks. He famously replied, "Because that's where the money is." Are you spending your time where there is likely to be a payoff for you? If you find that almost all of your friends know one another, consider that a clue. Staying with the investment analogy, it may be time to diversify your social portfolio. Keep your old friends, but try doing something different as well.

*

Good questions to explore include:
**How available are you?
**Do you really want a boyfriend?
**Or are you perfectly happy as an independent guy and just moaning about wanting a date because everyone else seems to be doing so?
**Are you emotionally accessible?
**Are you ready for the sort of openness intimacy requires of us?
**What about your schedule – are you always working, or are you involved in a hundred different causes and projects?
**How diversified is your social portfolio?
**Do you hang out with the same people virtually all the time?

*

Working long hours may be fine for your career, but it can play havoc on your social life. Doing volunteer work or socializing primarily with non-gay folks is fine, but you may want to think about spending time with other gay men as well if your goal is a romantic relationship.

*

Obviously, some of these points hit home with me. Thus, I may even end up playing volley ball today for the first time since I came out and no longer played it at the neighborhood pool trying to be "one of the guys" and blending in with the straight guys.